Disenchanting Illusions
by vamp1987
Summary: Sequel to Operation. Everything was wrong. This wasn't suppose to happen. How could one event change everything? While sorting through her grief, Hermione attempts to unriddle the Veil and rescue someone lost. Will she succeed or will the war intervene?
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer: JK Rowling, Scholastic, and WB own Harry Potter. I am making nothing from this.**

_**AN: AU for Half-Blood Prince.**__ I am changing a lot guys. This book out of the whole series never set well with me. This will have alternate pairings from the book and deaths. _

_There will be no Ginny and Harry and no Ron and Hermione. If those are the pairings you like, this story is not for you._

_I'm starting at the beginning at the end of OotP and changing the happenings in the DoM a bit._

_This is story will be slow going, but I hope you like it and will stick with it._

_The beginning is going to be darkish, so be warned._

* * *

"Merlin 'Mione, this stuff burns!"

"Stop being a baby."

"Get it off."

"Not for another ten minutes."

"It hurts."

"It'll be worth it."

A grumbled, "Says you," was the reply.

Hermione smiled despite herself at Sirius' pout.

"Beauty is pain, Sirius," declared Hermione dryly.

"It never has before. I think you're doing this as revenge for me walking in on you yesterday."

Before Hermione could reply, the room began to shift.

Suddenly Sirius disappeared as she felt someone grab her hand.

"We have to move," Harry demanded as he yanked Hermione forward.

She recognized the halls of her nightmare.

She was back in the Department of Mysteries.

No. Not again, she silently begged.

"Harry, what…"

Before she could question the situation, three Death Eaters appeared in front of her, Harry and Neville.

It was just like before.

Everything erupted into chaos.

She heard a scream behind her.

Run, run, run.

The word "Trap" echoed through her head as she skidded around another shelf of useless prophecies.

"Knock them over," yelled Harry as they turned another corner.

Without a second thought, Hermione plowed into the side of one of the shelves causing a domino effect.

"They were good for one thing," she declared as they continued to run and dodge streams of light.

"What," asked Harry as he sent a curse behind him.

"Blocked the path," she replied dryly.

She tripped as the room drastically turned and then she was falling.

Laughter surrounded her.

"What?"

"Shh," Sirius said from beside her. "It's getting good."

She was back at the movie theater.

Hermione turned to the man beside her and felt tears slowly fall.

He's safe, repeated in her head as she reached out to touch him. Not hurt. Not tortured. Safe. Here.

"'Mione," Sirius asked. The concern resonated in his voices as he raised a hand to wipe away her tears.

She launched herself into his arms and held him tight as she cried in relief.

But the moment was destroyed as she was ripped away from him again.

The room morphed and she was alone with a masked murderer in front of her.

"Not so brave all alone, are you pet," the man sneered.

A streak of blonde hair was all that alerted her before a spell knocked the Death Eater out.

It's Luna, Hermione's crowed in her mind.

Victory was short lived when a jet of color met its mark across Luna's chest.

"NO!"

"Blondie's down," cackled an insane woman who was lurking in the shadows. "The ickle children thought they could win against the big bad Death Eaters," she continued in a childish taunt.

Hermione shot a spell into the darkness, but the voice only continued to laugh.

Where? Where is she?

The shadows shifted.

There.

Too slow. The spell caught Hermione across the shoulder. She released a whimper as the pain traveled down to her fingertips.

As another curse came towards her, she dove to the ground and landed on a threadbare carpet.

She could hear Christmas music coming from the Muggle radio in the corner.

"Hermione, it's Christmas," declared a familiar voice in a husky tone behind her. "Put the book down and join the party."

Hands lifted her back to her feet. She expected pain, but there was none. Her shoulder was perfectly fine. No wound. No blood.

She looked into Sirius' smiling face. "I know your haul was good this year, but leave some for later, yeah," he laughed. "Don't want to read them all at once."

Before she could respond, something slashed across her back bringing her to her knees.

She could hear screaming around her but all she could process was the pain.

Lights danced before her eyes. Was she going to pass out, she wondered, or was it the spells flying around her?

She felt someone throw her arm across a shoulder and an arm under her knees lifting her into the air and close to a solid chest.

"I've got you," she heard rumble through the chest.

Then she was falling again.

A smiling Harry nudged her playfully. "Hey, you zoned out there. Where'd ya go?"

"What?" Hermione looked up into his brilliant emerald eyes. "I don't…"

"Is that another letter from Sirius," he asked seemingly oblivious to Hermione's lost expression.

She looked down into her hand and there was indeed a letter there. She automatically nodded to Harry's query.

"I think he writes you more than me," he declared without the normal jealousy.

"I…"

"Oh well, it won't last much longer."

"What?"

"He'll be gone soon."

"Harry?"

The smile Harry graced Hermione with chilled her to the core. She watched frozen as he pulled a knife out and stabbed her in the stomach.

She grabbed the wound to stop the bleeding and looked into silver eyes dancing with maddening glee.

"What do ya know? The Mudblood bleeds red after all," cackled the same crazy female from before.

"Hermione!"

She turned towards Harry's voice. He was being held down by two Death Eaters. He had blood running down his head. His wand was missing.

"Don't worry Potter. Your turn will come soon enough," said a gruff voice from behind the silver Death mask.

A jet of light knocked the woman off of Hermione before she could make another swipe with her blade.

"'Mione." The voice was half stating and half pleading. "Don't worry. I'll get you out," he declared as she felt her arm move.

The lights suddenly went out.

The black hole she found herself in was suffocating. She couldn't think; she couldn't breathe.

Something brushed her arm causing her to flinch away.

Her wand was gone and she couldn't see if an enemy lurked in the bleakness surrounding her.

An inhuman wail echoed around her. She tried to block it out by covering her ears, but it was surrounding her, covering her, coming from within her.

Tears leaked down her eyes.

She felt a presence in the black abyss.

"Get me out," cried Sirius pleadingly from the darkness.

Hermione awoke with a scream of both pain and fright. Sirius desperate plea resounded in her head even as her own ricocheted off the Infirmary walls.

Hands.

She could feel hands touching her, holding her, forcing her down.

She tried to fight them, but she was too weak. The pain was too strong.

With a final sob, Hermione welcomed the darkness.

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**What do you think? Review and let me know.**

I'm off to work on **Adventures**.


	2. Chapter 1

_AN: I'd like to thank_ **York**, **Cookiepirateface**, **Keira-House M.D., **_and_** hukomuyo** _for their reviews of the last chapter. _

_I know that the dream sequence was confusing, but I hope to clear some things up in the next few chapters with a more thorough look at the DoM scene._

_Also the votes have spoken so keep the pairing in mind throughout this chapter._

* * *

The nauseating smell of disinfectant was the first thing to assault her senses. With the addition of the crisp sheets that scratched her exposed skin, Hermione immediately knew where she was. I'm in the Hospital Wing, she thought with a grimace.

The next thing to inundate her slow synapses was pain. Her body felt like it was on fire, yet she momentarily wondered why she was positioned on her left side. The answer revealed itself through a piercing pain attacked the stomach region of her abdomen with a ferocity that had her biting back a scream. Her back ached with ever breath she took and her right shoulder throbbed. She momentarily felt drowned in the pain until it miraculously began to recede slightly.

The piercing pain dulled to a more manageable throb that only flared when she took deep breaths.

Upon further inspection, Hermione discovered the identity of her salvation. Her throat raw and in desperate need of water contained the foul aftertaste of various potions she had been fed. They must have been administered recently, she mused as she debated whether to open her eyelids and accept the fate that awaited her in the glaring light pressing between her lashes.

A shifting noise near her form made her decision for her. Her body instinctively tensed as she absorbed the countenance of her visitor. She could vaguely see a blurry outline of a figure resting beside her bed. She took in his garbled yet familiar voice and tried to make sense of the words he spoke.

"Come on Hermione," the voice begged. "You can't leave me. Everyone always leaves me. You have to wake up. I can't do this without you. "

Though her brain was still sluggish due to the pain potions she had been given, she recognized the need in that voice. She was not going to let him mourn for her. She was not going to let him sink into the arbitrary guilt that he cared around with him when an injustice occurred in his immediate vicinity. He had not forced her to go with him. Hell, he had asked her to stay behind. Doesn't he realize yet that he is not responsible for the actions of others? His desire to save everyone is not helping his fragile emotional state, she concluded as she siked her body up to answer his entreaties.

Come on Hermione, she insisted, Harry needs you so open your mouth and reassure him that you're not going to die.

Licking her parched lips, Hermione called out softly. "Har-ry." Her voice was but a soft whisper but it did it job.

Emerald eye alighted on her and blinked as if he was making sure his eyes were not playing tricks on him. Harry let out a relieved sigh. "'Mione." He reached to embrace his injured friend until he saw her give a slight wince. "Let me get Madam Pomfrey. I'll be right back." With that Harry disappeared around the privacy curtains.

She could feel the pain course through her as she moved, but it became a secondary concern as she stared at the place Harry had just vacated. Though she had only looked into his eyes for a moment, she recognized the haunted look in them.

Someone didn't make it out. Someone close to Harry didn't make it out. Someone he saw as family. Someone he was fighting to save.

"Not him," she begged the empty room.

Her pain shifted as her focus did. She no longer felt the burning from her physical wounds. Her heart rate escalated rapidly as the realization of who was lost knocked the breath from her lungs. A sob tore itself from her clamped throat.

The rapid footsteps and movement of the curtains were ignored as Hermione wallowed in her inner lamentations.

"Good to see you awake Miss Granger."

The light yet worried undertones of Madam Pomfrey's greeting were lost to her as she tried to regain her grip on the reality she had awoken to. She turned to Harry again as saw that same haunted look hiding behind his worried eyes. This isn't happening, she declared as she shook off the lingering cobwebs from her brain.

She needed to get out of this bed so she could prove that this wasn't happening. Hermione ignored the fussing hands that tried to prevent her movements or the reassuring words. She had to get out of this bed.

Her determination gave way to exhaustion after a short struggle with unrelenting hands.

Her world seemed to narrow as Harry obscured her vision. All that was important suddenly were those haunted emerald eyes looking beseechingly into her chocolate ones that spoke of nothing but pain and despair and guilt.

"Har-ry," she begged with a slight hitch.

He knew what she was asking. He recognized the pain in her eyes because he saw the same in his when he looked in a mirror. He dropped his head and shook it slightly.

"NO!"

He looked up to see Hermione fighting Madam Pomfrey to rise again. If they didn't stop her thrashing and jerking soon, she was going to do more damage to her already fragile body.

Harry rushed to her side and cradled her face in his palms. "Stop it 'Mione," he demanded. "Don't make it be a waste."

She instantly stilled as her eyes connected with his, and Harry watched something break in them. That last remaining shred of childhood innocence lost before his very eyes. He would have looked away if he was able, but something in those scared brown eyes stopped him. Neither of them noticed when Madam Pomfrey left the room.

Time seemed to stand still as they stared back at each other. It could have been hours or mere seconds before the tears she was so valiantly holding back released upon her realization that it was for her. It was because of her. He was dead because of _her_. She now remembered the strong arms that had cradled her close and the familiar scent that had surrounded her before the world had gone dark.

She collapsed back into the hospital cot. "My fault," escaped her lips in a broken whisper.

The dizzying realization spiraled out around her and then closed in tight. Guilt flooded her system like the pain did earlier. This was her doing. She caused Harry to lose someone important to him because she was not strong enough to fight. Her weakness did this. Her fault.

How did everything go so wrong?

"No," Harry roared. He forced her to look at him, to see the truth. "My fault."

Hermione looked at Harry, really looked at him for the first time since she found herself in the Hospital Wing. The cuts and bruises adorning his face had healed for the most part, but the dark circles under his eyes cast a sharp contrast against his pale skin and caused her some concern. When was the last time he had a full night's sleep? He seemed smaller than normal with his shoulders slumped forward as if the weight of the world was balanced on them. She could see the scar from Umbitch peaking out of his shirt sleeve. What other injuries was his plain maroon jumper hiding? Had he been eating? His face seemed shallower than normal.

The glassy sheen in his eyes made her wonder if he had been holding his grief in until, what? Until I woke up? Has no one else tried to talk to him? Has no one tried to reassure him?

What happened while she was asleep?

Then she thought about the people around him, the people he could turn to for support, and found most lacking. Ron, though good with distractions, has never been good with emotional discussions. He always left it up to Hermione saying, "Well, you're a girl, right? You should talk to him." The statement was always followed with either "I'll be in the Commons playing chess" or "In the kitchens to grab a bite." The twins, if they were even here, would try to make Harry laugh, so he was probably avoiding them. Humor was the last thing he wanted right now. Ginny just stares or shies away so no help from her. Molly smothers. Arthur would offer to sit down and listen whenever Harry felt up to it, but Harry never volunteers his feeling, so he's out too. Tonks would be part of the Ministry team to investigate what happen in the Department of Mysteries. Coupling that with her own grief, she wouldn't be available to Harry right now.

That only left Remus and Dumbledore. Both would listen to anything that Harry needed to get off of his chest. Hell, they would probably let him rage at them. The problem was that Dumbledore was preparing for war and Remus was helping. Harry needed someone with time to spare, time they couldn't offer.

The duty fell once again to Hermione, and she'd be damned if she let him down now when he needed her the most.

Ignoring the resistance in her shoulder, Hermione pulled Harry into a tight hug. She placed her mouth near his ear and whispered, "Sirius is not your fault, do you understand?" When Harry tried to fight her and pull away, Hermione tightened her hold. "He would not want you to cast blame that is not yours onto yourself. You did not force him to go. You did not cast the spell. He died honorably and to act differently is disgracing his sacrifice."

"He just fell," Harry mumbled numbly into her hair. The words had rushed forward in such a way that confirmed her fears; he had been holding them in, praying that they were lies. As long as he refused to admit it to himself, he could ignore what everyone else had said was true.

She knew even as her own heart took a blow that he had to get them out, had to say the words for him to move on in his grief. The shock and denial were crippling him, and she had always made it her job to keep him whole.

Pulling back, Hermione asked for clarification.

Harry momentarily struggled with his words, and his eyes became unfocused as if he was seeing the event in real time all over again. Even standing there watching it happen, he still couldn't completely understand it. "In the Death Chamber, Bellatrix hit him with a spell that knocked him into the Veil. He just fell into it, 'Mione."

"He couldn't be retrieved," she asked with a frown, not completely understand what happened herself.

"There is no retrieving. He just fell in." The shrug Harry offered illustrated more than just confusion and frustration. Hermione could see in that one gesture that Harry was fighting the "official" answer.

"What was the spell?"

"What?" Harry focused his attention back to Hermione.

"What spell was he hit with?"

"I don't know."

"Do you remember the color," she pressed.

Harry didn't answer right away. Hermione could tell by the furrowing of his brow that he was trying to ascertain whether or not he did indeed see the jet of color that hit the last member of his family. "Red." It was more of a question than an answer. With a nod of his head, he declared, "Red."

"She stunned him." Hermione couldn't help the shock that colored her tone.

"Don't think of it as a mercy Hermione," said a voice of to her right. "She knew that spell would knock him in."

"Remus," whispered Hermione, swallowing back the sob that wanted to break free. He looked horrible. The patches under his eyes were tinted almost as dark as Harry's and his pale skin caused his silver scars to look more pronounced. The grays in his hair appeared dominant among the sandy locks. He seemed to have aged ten years in so many days. "Sit down before you fall down," she demanded as she saw him sway slightly.

"I can't stay long," he said with a sigh, rubbing one of his large hands over his face and into his hair. "I just wanted to check on you before heading to Headquarters."

"You're going to get some rest, right?"

"Hermione…"

"How is everyone else?" interrupted Hermione, ignoring Remus entreaties.

"Everyone else has already been released. Ginny had broken her ankle and Ron got hit will a nasty spell, but Pomfrey patched them up," Harry said gruffly. "We've been waiting for you to wake up."

"No need to wait now," she replied in an overly chipper voice.

"Hermione…" tried Remus again only to be once more interrupted.

"No, I will not have you dead on your feet. I am perfectly fine, so no need to worry over…"

Remus interrupted with an irate bark of "You are not fine." He took a deep breath before continuing in a much calmer tone. "You have been unconscious for three days."

"Three days," Hermione said with a near-shout.

"Hermione, you almost died," whispered Harry.

She held his closed hand tightly in one of her own. "You can't lose me that easily. This," she waved towards her bandages, "is nothing."

Harry ripped his hand away and began to pace the length of her bed as he tugged on his hair viciously. "You were stabbed Hermione," Harry raged. "That bitch nicked your liver. If it wasn't for…" The falter let her know exactly who was to thank for saving her life. "There was so much blood," Harry continued to mumble to no one in particular. "You would have died in five minutes from blood loss if he hadn't…you could have…'Mione." Harry collapsed beside Hermione as he finally let his grief out. The tears leaking down his face were not only for her, but for Sirius, and for Ron, and for Ginny. They were for all the injuries sustained that night. The grief and guilt had become too much and all Hermione could do was hold him while he cried.

The brave front she had constructed once again crumbled in the face of her friend's torment. She didn't know how she was going to fix this but she was. She would not let Harry suffer the loss of someone else he loved. If there was even a change, no matter how minute that he was still alive, she was going to find it. A stupid curtain was not going to stand in her way. She refused to let this be the end of Sirius Black. She refused. The man was a surviver.

Despite her determination, a nagging sense of dread twisted her stomach. The world had tilted while she slept. The winds of war had once again swept across the Wizarding world. She could only hope, as she laid back down after Madam Pomfrey chased her visiters away, that they were prepared better this time around.

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**What do you think? Let me know.**


	3. Chapter 2

_AN: I'd like to thank_ **York**, **Cookiepirateface**, **Keira-House M.D., **_and_** hukomuyo** _for their reviews of the last chapter. You guys rock!_

_Oh, bit of language in this chapter (well one word, really), but I thought I would warn you up front._

* * *

The occupants of the Hospital Wing experienced different reactions upon discovering the empty bed tucked neatly behind privacy curtains.

The best friends of the person who was suppose to be in the bed sent each other a weighted look, and with a nod of their heads, they took off to recover their wayward friend. A slight detour to the Gryffindor dormitories was the first and foremost thought in their minds.

The nurse who reigned dominion over the Wing went away muttering and grumbling about stubborn lions that constantly refuse to heed her good advice and stay in bed until told differently.

The Headmaster's normally twinkling eyes dimmed and the Deputy Headmistress's lips pursed as they silently left the room with the knowledge that the missing teenager would not be recovered for some time.

As the room cleared, no one noticed the disillusioned figure lurking in the shadows with calculating eyes.

* * *

The two friends surveyed the map to discern the location of the missing hospital patient. Ron scowled in disbelief when he finally spotted her name. "The library," he cried incredulously. "What is she doing there? Studying? She should know better than to leave before she is properly healed."

Harry ran a hand wearily through his messy locks and shrugged helplessly. He had a feeling he knew why Hermione prematurely released herself from the Hospital Wing and went straight to the library.

That reason would be Harry's big mouth.

When his emotional breakdown finally reached an end, Harry unloaded more devastating news on Hermione.

He was predestined to die.

…_Neither can live while the other survives…_

To say that Hermione did not take the prophecy well was an understatement. She laughed for a solid ten minutes upon the announcement that the self-declared, most powerful dark wizard ever based the future of his bigoted reign on the preposterous predictions of a sherry-chugging delusional dingbat. Harry knew Hermione did not like Trelawney but her imitation of his divination teacher at the end of her rant put to rest any lingering doubt he may have inadvertently been holding on to.

The one thing he was positive about was that Hermione's eyes took a certain gleam after he revealed that Dumbledore had known about the prophecy all along and decided to finally inform Harry in the wake of yet another personal tragedy. Harry had recognized that look then in the Hospital Wing but refused to admit that Hermione would do anything to jeopardize her recovery.

He had been wrong.

The proof was sitting right in front of him at her normal table tucked in the back of her sanctuary. Merlin, she looked like an escaped mental patient.

Sitting all by herself lost in her books was Hermione in her hospital gown and robe. The nonsensical mumbling only added to the frazzled image she conveyed. Gone was the well organized and starched Prefect. In her place was a girl lost in a sea of thick tomes that she barely had the strength to lift. Her hair, though tamed and shorter after the summer's escapades, was strangling a pencil in its bound confines atop her head. Her face, naturally tinted with a bronzy glow, appeared washed-out and weary. Harry knew she wasn't sleeping well yet the potions Pomfrey had her on kept her in a perpetual state of fatigue. Something in the hunch of her shoulders spoke of a determination that bordered on desperation. Her desire to right all of the perceived wrongs of the world stood visible in the tilt of her head and the draw of her mouth. Her cupid's bow lips that normally inhabited a serene smile while reading were gnawed to the point of bleeding. The most changed however was her eyes. The chocolate pools that always held such intellect and confidence were dimmed and haunted. The laughter was missing as if sucked from her very being the moment Sirius went through the veil.

All-in-all, she looked an absolute wreck.

Running a hand through his messy black hair, Harry nodded to Ron.

His studious friend was so lost in her thoughts and frantic search that she never noticed the approach of the remaining two-thirds of their trio or the confused stares from her classmates due to her appearance.

* * *

It had finally happened.

She couldn't believe that it had finally happened.

The library, her sanctuary, the place that yielded all the answers she sought had come up empty.

She could find nothing that she could use.

Nothing!

How was that even possible? Wasn't the primary function of a library to impart knowledge? It can't impart if there is no knowledge on the subject to begin with.

The library failed at its job to provide Hermione with the information she sought.

Ahh!

Hermione despondently dropped her head onto her work table only to instantly shoot back up when she felt a stab of pain in her abdomen. Great, she thought, I think I pulled a stitch, _again_.

Madam Pomfrey worked miracles with accidental mishaps from students' spell backfires and potion blowups but a simple knife injure had to heal mostly on its own, or so she claimed. She could re-grow the bones in a twelve-year old's arm but a stab wound took weeks of pain potions and stitches.

Where was the fairness in that?

The Gods of Justice and Equality for Inflicted Wounds were apparently on vacation, Hermione finally decided as she turned back to her research only to slam the book closed when it dared to continue to not yield any useable facts. Or the gods hated her like the library seemed too.

Merlin, she was tired.

Hermione rubbed her eyes in a hope to stifle off the oncoming tension headache she could feel building in her brow.

The words before her though useless had blurred to the point of unrecognizability. Maybe leaving the Hospital Wing had been a mistake after all. How was she supposed to help Harry if she could barely keep her eyes open? She felt bone weary and disconnected. The pain potions left her in a hazy, unable to concentrate for long periods until they started to wane.

She had escaped the ever watchful eyes of Madam Pomfrey before she could give her today's dose of the putrid-flavored brew. Sometimes she thought the potions were purposely foul as punishment for getting injured in the first place. The taste would linger for hours upon Hermione's tongue despite her constant consumption of the pieces of Hogsmeade fudge Ron continually snuck in to her. She preferred the pain to that horrid concoction Pomfrey insists on jamming down her throat every four hours.

Pushing the hair that had escaped from her loose bun out of her face, Hermione squared her resolve. She was just going to have to go to the source its self, she decided.

It would be tricky, but with the proper planning and the right connections, she just might be able to get an audience with the only people who could help.

Loosing herself once again in her thoughts, Hermione missed the determined expression upon the face of a certain redhead too late to prevent the upcoming disaster.

* * *

Ron thundered towards his swotty friend and without any sense of self-preservation grabbed Hermione's shoulder.

His endeavor resulted in him receiving a wand in the face; a wand that had a glowing tip.

Harry used his seeker reflexes to yank Hermione's wand hand up as the spell released. A jet of red shot over the Arithmancy shelves and collided with the wall right beside Madam Pince's head. The pinch-faced Librarian shot up from her desk and pointed menacingly at the trio and then at the library doors. Her message was received loud and clear.

Harry spelled Hermione's books back to their rightful shelves. He didn't need Madam Pince black listing them for the offense of leaving her precious books just lying around after a perceived assassination attempt.

Ron grabbed Hermione's bag and her arm so he could literally drag her out of there. No sense in staying where they weren't wanted.

In their rush to leave, none of the trio recognized the magnitude of what just transpired. Hermione not only reacted on instinct but cast a nonverbal spell unconsciously.

Once the trio made it into the hall, Hermione jerked her arm out of Ron's grasp. "What is wrong with you?"

"_Me_?" Ron looked to Harry in disbelief. "Bloody hell, you almost stunned me!"

"You grabbed my arm," said Hermione. Her tone indicated that she found that a sound reason for almost jinxing her friend.

"You didn't even look before firing," continued Ron.

Harry could tell Ron was not letting this go any time soon. He cut in before Hermione could retort and redirected the conversation to the reason they came to the library in the first place. "Why did you leave without permission?"

"Leave where?" asked Hermione innocently, as she began to walk in the direction of Gryffindor Tower.

"Hermione."

The way Harry said her name, concerned with a twinge of desperation, made her stop in her tracks with her back remaining to him.

"You're bleeding."

"Fuck," Hermione mumbled, just loud enough for the other two to hear her. She couldn't resist rolling her eyes heavenward in silent aggravation. So not fair.

"Harry…did she…did you…?" stumbled Ron.

"Ron, are you sure they fixed you completely after the Brain Room incident? You do not seem to have a full grasp on the Queen's English."

"No need to be mean, Hermione," said Ron sullenly.

"It's only mean if it's untrue, Weaselbee," sneered a voice from the shadows.

Emerging from around the corner was Malfoy and his bumbling brutes of an entourage. The normally haughty smirk of Malfoy's ferret-face was surprisingly absent. His features seemed more drawn and sharp today.

Absently, Hermione wondered if that had something to do with his father's imprisonment and the public embarrassment of his family name now their connection to Voldemort was revealed sans more Imperius claims.

Hermione shrugged. She didn't really care. The bastard got what was coming to him in her opinion. Throwing curses at children for Merlin's sake.

Truthfully, Lord Malfoy was probably safer in Azkaban. He lost the orb Voldemort coveted so much. And after the diary debacle, he could not have endeared himself any more into his Dark Lord's good graces. He would probably be dead now, she mused. They actually did the bigot a services by locking him up.

The image of an unkempt Malfoy thanking them for imprisoning him brought a smile to Hermione's face until she looked back towards her friends.

Both Harry and Ron had pulled their wands. Luckily they still had them at their sides but at the slightest provocations spells would be flying. She did not need this now, damn it. She was bleeding and in need of medical assistance that was preferably not Madam Pomfrey. That woman would ward her bed to prevent further escape attempts if she went back there.

Her day just kept getting better and better. She typically didn't feel quite satisfied with her day anymore until she verbally emasculated Malfoy, but she was not in the mood right now to play mediator. Best to defuse the situation, and if the tremble of Harry's wand was any indication, it needed to be fast.

Undaunted by the interruption, Hermione continued on her path as she said, "Take your childish drama elsewhere Malfoy. We are in a hurry…"

"Granger, you're bleeding." The astonishment in Malfoy's voice momentarily startled her. Why would her ability to bleed shock him?

Shaking her head, she continued, "Like I was saying, we are in a rush to get to…"

"To the Hospital Wing," cut in Harry, directing his remark to Hermione.

She glared at him for a moment before giving a resigned sigh at the determined edge in his emerald eyes. "To the Hospital Wing," she conceded.

Hermione couldn't help but think as she walked away that for the first year since entering the Magical world she was actually looking forward to summer. She really could use a break from academia before she got killed or driven insane. She didn't want her Head Girl opportunities to be ripped from her because of hotheads and their inability to keep their mouths shut and their wands hidden.

Hopefully, she could get home without further incident, Hermione mused, as she felt Harry's hands on her shoulders so he could turn her around and escort her back to the Hospital Wing.

As they walked down the hall and away from the baffled Slytherins, she couldn't help but hum "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" to herself.

With a bit of luck, things would be better after a few weeks of rest.

If only she knew that now the Dark Lord had made his presence known once again the Magical world would be rocked to its foundation, she might have decided transferring was a better option to staying in a war zone.

Ignorance is bliss and all that after all. She would learn before the summer was out however that no one is safe from evil. Not even the Muggle world.

* * *

_That is it for this chapter. Hope you liked it._

_I have a quick inquiry guys. _

_How are we feeling about Draco? _

_I haven't decided how I want to work his task in the sixth book. As of right now, it does not affect the plot I have in mind because the Death Eaters are going to need to attack Hogwarts or Hogsmeade, but the circumstances might change. My question pertains more to possible redemption/spy capabilities for the bouncing ferret. _

_Let me know._

_Next chapter: Introduction to the mysterious Grangers that are forever mentioned yet never heard._

**Review?**


	4. Chapter 3

_**AN:**__ So Sorry for the delayed update! RL and writer's block got in the way. I'm going to try to update more frequently now that I have an actual plan, but I just got a new job in the marketing department at school--Writing experience here I come!—so no promises. _

_Anyway, I would like to thank all those who faved and alerted for the last chapter. I hope you continue showing interest even thought updates are so spread out._

_I also want to give a huge THANK YOU to_ **York, Keira-House, Senko Ryu, Adryana, **_and_** littlereid** _for the reviews. I live for these things and they give me the motivation to keep writing, so thank you._

_Oh, and heads up, we're getting into complete _**AU territory**_ from here on out. So buckle up for a trip to the Twilight Zone folks, it's going to be a bumpy ride._

* * *

Sweat clung to his skin. Muscles taunt, back arched, a grunt escaped his lips. The ache in his limbs throbbed to the beat of his racing heart. All he had to do to reach completion was stretch a little further, bend a little higher, but his body just was not cooperating. He could feel the need burning deep within him, could taste it even, yet he could not obtain it. The finish line kept inching away from him. He could feel the despair entering him as he looked into her eyes as she too realized it was pointless. He could not do it.

"I'm sorry," he said.

"Try just a little bit harder," she pleaded.

But it was useless. They both knew it. It was time to stop.

In a last ditch effort to achieve what they both wanted, she forced his leg backward.

"Ow Hermione, I don't bend that way."

Frustrated with his inability to cooperate, Hermione swapped tactics. She decided to bait him into the right move. "I could do it. You don't want to be beaten by girl, do you?"

"You're more flexible than me."

"Stop whining and twist into position."

"The human body is not meant to do this," he insisted, knowing instinctually what she was trying to do and refusing to fold. He knew his body better than she after all. If he said he could not do it, he could not do it. No amount of prodding from her would entice him further.

"The person demonstrating it clearly can," she declared as she watched his body relaxing back into the starting position.

"That's a drawing," he pointed out unnecessarily.

"That's not the point. You could do the last one," she said expectantly.

"The last one wasn't so difficult," he countered.

"This was your idea," she stated as her hands found their temporary home upon her hips.

"You were the one who insisted on that particular book. Where did you find it anyway? Never thought _you_ would go in that section."

"You make it sound sordid," said Hermione as she attempted to push his leg higher one more time.

"Seriously, I can't do this."

Hermione dropped Harry's leg and crossed her arms. "Fine," she sighed, closing the book. "We have class anyway so do the cool down stretches while I gather our stuff."

Harry grumbled under his breath as he tried to unwind his sour muscles. For three weeks now, Hermione had been arriving to Privet Drive at 10:30 on the dot every day without fail since the end of term.

The cheeky little witch had pulled the dynamic Dursleys aside the moment she spotted them after they departing the train at King's Cross and proceeded to make some sort of arrangement with them. All parties involved refused to repeat the conversation but Harry could guess its content from the activities Hermione had lined up for him on that first day.

She was training him.

And the Dursleys were letting her.

Somehow she got his _loving_ family's permission to leave the house everyday for physical training.

The only way Harry could conceive that his aunt and uncle would agree with this arrangement was because it got him out of their line of sight for a majority of the day, and Hermione guaranteed that no financial help was necessary for the summer venture.

He was sure the physical pain he experienced helped matters slightly.

Of course, Harry conceded to himself, her solicitations did come after the Order members threatened his relatives. Hermione must have been a breath of fresh air after that.

But, who could deny her with all of the benefits she provided.

Hermione made sure that nothing she had planned interfered with his daily chores. The Dursleys still relied on his cooking for two meals a day and free landscaping maintenance. He still helped Petunia clean the house once a week. All that really changed was that instead of locking him in his room to sulk for hours on end, Harry had something productive to fill that time with.

What shocked Harry more than his daily excursions away from the House of Hell was that despite her association with him the Dursleys were beginning to look forward to Hermione's arrival each day. Of course, Harry mentally added, as he stretched his quad muscles, Dudley's infatuation with the brunette and her constant appearance in Muggle clothing might have contributed to their begrudged acceptance of her.

Hermione was the perfect picture of a normal teenager. She drove the car her parent presented her for perfect grades, a 1994 Nissan Skyline GTS-T. When she needed to talk, she used the telephone, and all calls were finished before Vernon's favorite TV show. She never intruded in their affairs. She was always respectful. She never lost her temper (which is saying something for Hermione). Hell, she even offered to tutor Dudley with the subjects he was having trouble with this summer.

Harry did not know how she did it, but they bloody loved her!

Not that he cared.

The Dursleys could rot for all the shit they put him through.

What he could not understand was why she put so much effort into this…this convoluted, time-consuming, pain-inducing, mentally exhausting, absolutely brilliant scheme of hers.

He knew part of it had to do with preparing him for the war that was simply a matter of time. Every class they took was designed to better him in some way. The archery classes every Monday were to perfect his aim. The martial art classes every Tuesday and Thursday were to help him gain mental and emotional balance while increasing his reflexes and ability to read his opponent. They would also come in handy if he lost his wand. Hand-to-hand combat was not the traditional method of fighting for wizards but any little bit would help at this point. The fencing lessons every Wednesday were also to improve his reflexes, and like Hermione conceded, he never knew when he might have to battle another abnormally large magical snake that was impervious to spells.

The physical toil though was not simply war-related.

He knew that much.

Hermione had always put his needs before hers. Something, he begrudgingly acknowledge, he never really thanked her for. But despite his lack of gratitude, she continued to look out for him. Almost like a…like a parent would. And that was something he was eternally grateful for, despite his inability to express it in words.

She was his one constant.

His rock.

Each class he took throughout the week, Hermione accompanied him to.

On top of the physical training, she was also tutoring him on non-curriculum defensive spells in between his weekly lessons. He could not actually practice them, but the wand movement and enunciation were half the battle anyway. Hermione already promised to keep the tutoring up once classes began in the Fall. She even had a schedule worked out. Multiple versions, in fact. Each version varied to account for class surprises and Quidditch practices. The Occlumency practices gave him a headache, but he could tell a definite difference from what Snape taught him. If teaching is what one would call the sanctioned torture sessions, that is.

Bending into the last position of his cool-down routine, Harry could not forget to add the yoga lessons they started and ended each day off with to his mental list.

Harry felt tired just thinking about all of it.

But he wouldn't change one moment.

He loved the physical training. He loved discovering his limits and then learning to surpass them. He loved hitting the mark that he had always missed prior. He loved, strangely enough, getting hit; that momentary pain made him feel alive, gave him a feeling of accomplishment.

He loved it all.

He just didn't know how Hermione _did_ it.

She seemed to be on some sort of mission to fill every hour of every day with exhausting tasks.

Her workaholic tendencies were starting to drive him barmy.

The activities she scheduled with him ate hours out of her day. But they didn't stop there.

She tutored Dudley every Friday for three hours on whatever subject he was struggling with.

Sunday was her Family day. The entire day consisted of whatever her parents wanted to do: shopping, visiting relatives, board games—Hermione apparently was the undefeated Scrabble Queen—household chores, etc.

Every day had a schedule.

Every day had a plan.

Every day except for Saturday.

Saturday was a complete mystery to Harry. He knew she did something during those twenty-four hours. But whatever it was, she kept it to herself.

Originally, Harry thought she was spending time with a boy. It seemed logical for her to feel her only free day with fun, and Hermione definitely deserved to have a little fun now and again.

And for a while, Harry thought that boy was one Fred Weasley.

Fred and Hermione had been getting pretty chummy lately. They wrote letters back and forth constantly. They were even working out schematics involving long distant communication notepads that would save on owl flight time. So far, only half of the note was arriving, but Hermione was looking into some type of charm amplification to counteract the fragmentation disturbance the distance was causing, or so she said.

It still boggled his mind how close those two were getting.

Harry felt a momentary prang of sympathy for Ron. Ron, who had been secretly crushing on his best female friend since last year, could not stand the idea of competition for the affections of someone he felt he had prior claim on. This idea of prior claim is what is going to get his in trouble, Harry mused darkly.

He knew the contention his best mate and his best friend was eventually going to explode into a huge catastrophic cataclysm (he always liked alliteration since primary school), but no matter how much he tried to get through to Ron, the boy just wouldn't hear reason. And to find out that her feeling are not only not return, but are directed towards his brother, a brother that he has always been slightly envious of, well…it just couldn't end without tears and fists.

But, as he discovered last week, Fred was not the one occupying Saturday's mysterious vacancy.

No. Fred had confirmed that fact when he told Harry that Saturdays were when the Order had their meetings.

So, that day was reserved for someone else. And Merlin help him, Harry was constantly gritting his teeth to not ask who else she was spending time with.

His curiosity was killing him.

But he wouldn't ask. It was not his business. Hermione would tell him if she felt he needed to know. He just wished…

"Harry?"

Hermione poked her head back into the room. He could see the duffle bag slung over her shoulder.

"You ready to go? If we don't leave now, we'll be late."

"Yeah," Harry grabbed his own bag from the corner of the room and followed her out of the house.

She would tell him, he knew, he just wished it would be soon. He cut his eyes left to catch Hermione's profile, taking in her rumpled appearance. He hated waiting.

* * *

"I'm so sorry Harry."

"It's fine."

"I didn't mean to."

"I'm ok."

"It's just that you moved."

"You didn't hurt me."

"And I couldn't stop."

"It's just a bruise."

"Let me get some more ice."

"The ice I have hasn't melted yet."

"I'll be right ba…"

"Hermione." Harry grabbed her arm before she could retreat once again into the kitchen to get more unnecessary ice. "Look at me."

Hermione looked at Harry's face and winced. The bruise was already forming across his left cheek.

"Hermione, stop feeling guilty," said Harry, pulling Hermione to sit beside him on the couch. "You didn't do anything wrong."

She scoffed. "I punched you in the face."

"Because I didn't block fast enough."

As Hermione opened her mouth to redirect the blame once again, Harry placed a finger against her lips to stop her. "I'm not mad. If anything, I'm happy."

Hermione looked at Harry incredulously. How could someone be happy about a black eye? Must be boy logic, she thought with a mental shrug.

Harry gave a breathy laugh, reading her thoughts from her expression. "It was good hit. You snuck past my defenses. I knew you had mean left hook. I should have been paying closer attention."

Hermione looked at the bruise again before dropping her eyes to her hands. "It was a good hit wasn't it," she said with a small smile.

"Are you kidding? You knocked me on my ass with that hit," said Harry laughingly.

Hermione shoved his shoulder. "I wouldn't have even got the shot in if you weren't checking out that girl in the blues."

Harry had the decency to blush. The red in his cheeks seemed to dim the bruise momentarily. "I told you it was my fault," he grumbled, still not able to completely loose the smile on his face.

He had been doing that a lot lately: smiling, laughing, enjoying life without worrying about the world crashing down around him. Hermione knew it was still there, hovering just beyond his immediate scope, waiting for the worst possible moment to attack. The pain and anger would not be vacating him any time soon. He had too many things keeping it there, be it regret, be it blame, be it any number of negative emotions drowning that little spark that had survived this long. She knew loosing Sirius was the last straw, but she couldn't, no, she _refused_ to let a single stupid mistake destroy her best friend. His eyes had already lost their luster. They had a hardness about them now that reminded her of her grandpa's after the Second World War.

She would just have to make sure that the smiles and laughs continued, even if she had to punch him again to receive them.

Ruffling his hair, mussing the already disarrayed locks further, Hermione bit her lip as she again took in the bruise. "I might have some healing balm left. It won't remove it completely, but it will speed up the healing."

Conceding to her need to make amends, Harry graciously nodded.

Hermione quickly went to retrieve the healing remedy before Harry became obstinate and refused the help like he was known to. Hurrying into her bathroom, Hermione accidentally knocked some of the haphazardly strewn pages atop her desk to the floor. The papers littering the floor were covered in different types of symbols and multiple foreign scripts.

Slowly and with the utmost care, Hermione began to pick them up and rearrange them on her desk. She lightly brushed her fingers across the apparent disorder covering all ends and angles of her normally neat desk. Books laid open with scribbled margins. Pages and pages of notes and drawings charted the progress of a brilliant mind faced with an unsolvable problem. Pictures of a single object taken at multiple angles and different resolutions scattered sparsely among the chaos.

Looking up, Hermione gazed at the wall the desk rested on and saw the same pages containing the same foreign scripts and symbols adorning it. The wall also contained multiple pictures of the artifact as the desk, the artifact that haunted her dreams nightly. Blackness suffocated her as she drowned each night in piercing screams and lamenting wails. The constant plea for rescue, for salvation jerked her out of her disturbing nightmares. She hadn't had a full night's sleep since the battle.

If only she could decode the dreams, decode the meaning, the mystery surrounding it, maybe she could make them stop, give herself some peace. Maybe…

Stop it, she demanded.

Turning her back on her ghosts, she continued to the bathroom for the needed potion. She would contend with the elements decorating her wall accordingly in its scheduled time and no sooner. She couldn't handle doing it any sooner.

Grabbing the bottle she was looking for, Hermione rushed out of her room without glancing at anything but the door leading to the exit.

Saturday would be here soon. She both longed for and dreaded that solitary day each week. Her progress had stalled. All avenues available to her resulted in dead-ends and bitter disappointments.

Closing her bedroom door, Hermione straightened her shoulders and fixed a smile upon her face. She would not let Harry know she was troubled.

She would not.

She would continue on like always until she had answers. She embraced her self-imposed mission as protector and refused to let her own melancholy destroy all her hard earned progress.

She was a fighter.

She fought for Harry, always for Harry.

Now she was starting to fight for something else, something more. She wasn't sure what that something was just yet, but she knew her conundrum would shed some needed light.

All she needed was to find the switch. A simple flick would illuminate everything.

And that switch was in the one place she hoped she would never have to journey to again. But she would, she decided, as she looked in Harry's eyes once more, because he needed her too.

She just wished she knew which _he_ she meant.

Shaking her head and taking a deep breath, Hermione set her resolve. She already had a plan forming in her mind. She would do anything to put that spark back in Harry's eyes again. Anything.

* * *

_I know there was a lot of Harry and Hermione. If you didn't like Harry's introspective, blame the yoga. De-stressing always makes a person think, so what can you do._

_Sorry, I know I said the Grangers would make an appearance but not until next chapter. I felt I needed to set up the summer activities first._

_Up next: Research progress on the Veil and a violent encounter._

**Like it? Hate it? Let me know.**


	5. Chapter 4

_AN: I got the next chapter out, YAY! This was a birthday present to myself. I wasn't sure I was going to be able to finish it in time, but I had a spurt of inspiration thanks to Adam Lambert's music. Weird combination but it helped me write so I'm taking it._

_I'd like to thank __**ooohhhlaalaa**__, __**Keira-House**__, and __**Adryana**__ for their reviews of the last chapter. _

_The chapter is for __**ooohhhlaalaa**__. She wanted some Dursley cameos. _

_I also have some of the Veil research here. It's long but hopefully worth reading. I have made the Veil uber-difficult to explain why there seems to be no information about it. I have read multiple stories and articles that have various explanation regarding the Veil, the most popular being a form of death sentence because of its location in the Death Chamber at the bottom of an auditorium. I even read somewhere that the Veil could be where the Dementors come from. I'm trying to keep these theories in mind while I work out exactly what I want the Veil to mean in this story. It's still vague in my mind about the things actual function. It made this chapter really difficult to write._

_In fact, this was one of the most difficult chapters I have written so far, and despite how many times I have reread and rework it, I'm still not sure I really like it. But, again, hopefully you will._

* * *

She still couldn't believe it.

The Hogwarts library continued to yield nothing. No new information. No incite. No answers.

She originally thought it a fluke. Maybe she was searching in the wrong place, the wrong section, the wrong books. Never before had the library held such little information of a needed subject. The Restricted Section didn't even yield a reference to her plight. She had checked and rechecked all of her information but nothing new developed.

All her hard work and bribery were for not; exploiting Madam Pince's weakness, unnecessary.

Hermione discovered said weakness at the end of her first year at Hogwarts purely by accident and after she no longer needed to exploit it. Madam Pince had a surprising weakness for Muggle literature of all kinds, but her ultimate Achilles' heel was Harlequin and bodice rippers. One risqué novel in her second-year guaranteed Hermione a free pass to the Restricted Section for three months. Luckily, Lockhart provided the passes for the rest of the year, or Hermione would have had to send a rather awkward letter home explaining her direr need for trashy romantic fiction.

But none of that mattered now.

Implementing the copying charm that Fred showed her that had guaranteed Hermione continuous access to her most reliable resources was useless. She had copious amounts of rendered texts surrounding her but none of them were usable.

It was like the Veil just mysteriously popped out of thin air one day and no one has been able to decipher the tiniest piece of information about it. Hermione knows that this line of inquiry is preposterous because just studying the stupid thing for two month from pictures enabled her to glean some facts, minuscule or not.

Giving up on the Hogwarts material, Hermione unburied her secret weapon, which unsurprisingly was another book. This book was special however. It was a secret Christmas present from Sirius and Remus. She remembered Sirius joking that he and Remus constructed the magical wonder between his brooding sessions and verbal scuffles with Molly.

In her hand lay a seemingly ordinary leather-bound book. The corners were still in perfect condition despite the multiple shoves back into its secret home in her desk drawer and kicks under the bed it had suffered. The indestructibility seemingly bled over into the pages within the text. Instead of constantly worrying about ripping pages from frustration or hast, Hermione could flip through her book as fast as her fingers could flick without the threat of paper cuts or wrinkled sheets. The margins on each page also expanded to incorporate all of her notes and notations.

Despite the beautiful craftsmanship inherent in the book's binding and unique functions offered, the content is was where the true spectacle resided.

Hermione lovingly ran her fingertips over the thin covers of her book that contained the entire Black library. The book even included some texts that no longer rested within the Black ancestral walls. Hermione was actually certain that several of the books within her present were banned during the Reformation and one or two were reportedly destroyed during the Witch Trials. How Sirius was able to incorporate those texts into her present was a wonder onto itself.

The book was password protected, like any good Marauder creation. Hermione choice required a multi-translated password. Even if someone was familiar with the Muggle magical enchantment she ironically adopted, they would need to know ancient Cuneiform, Sanskrit, and Egyptian hieroglyphics before successfully opening her most prized secret.

She silently thanked the heavens once more for her eidetic memory and the inheritance of her father's fascination with dead languages. Summers spent learning dead languages were certainly not time wasted.

If anyone did ever manage the astronomical feat of decoding her password and opening the book, they would simply see a reference list of all the books in the possession of the Black family.

A piece of intrinsic and ingenious magic was necessary to unravel the mystery of her Christmas present. When Sirius had shown her the answer to the riddle, Hermione could not help but look at him with a new since of awe and intrigue. The man was truly an enigma wrapped in a riddle.

She had only begun to crack the surface of the information contained in the small book. Constantly worrying about who was walking around Grimmauld Place and Hogwarts at all times interfered with her peaceful reading until recently. Hermione had desperately wanted to curl up with her new toy since summer began but the rigorous schedule she set for herself and subsequently Harry prevented it. Now however, she had no time for lollygagging, she had a mission. Granted it was self-appointed and no one had even the slightest hint of an idea what she was doing but that was beside the point. She had a mission. She had to save Sirius from the Veil if possible. And if it was not possible, she would hopefully make some significant dint into the quandary surrounding the artifact.

Hermione had spent the last two months of Saturdays scouring her reference book looking for any hint of information pertaining to the Veil. The few things she had gleaned were hair-pullingly frustrating.

The Veil itself contained foreign markings throughout its exterior. Hermione believed the marking were a bastardized form of Gaelic and Latin combined with some form of Germanic runes and pictish symbols. Hermione could even identify some Cornish and Manx missed into the vernacular depicted on the archways. Her translation so far was sketchy at best. She has no real familiarity with these languages outside of what she gleaned from her dad, who was of Irish descent. Therefore, she had been in contact with an old friend of her dad's, Dr. Winston Roper, who specializes in ancient translations for the British Museum, but so far he has been as stumped as Hermione about what the inscriptions on the Veil could mean.

The presence of the Veil within the Death Chamber in the Department of Mysteries stemmed from, in Hermione's mind, the repetitive depiction of the word death upon the arch itself; this revelation was awarded with Hermione's discovery of her Christmas present's indestructibility.

The disconcerting presence of the word death however was a silver lining. Death was the most easily translated word on the Veil. Anyone with a basic grasp of Latin could read that one word. It was the words surrounding death that were the real unknowns. The Gaelic, Cornish, and Manx— which had effectively died from the vernacular of the UK—inhabited the spacing around death all over the artifact.

The words surrounding death were not as simply decoded. After weeks of study, Hermione along with Dr. Roper unraveled a very hopeful antecedent for the presence of death.

There were negatives in front of some of the deaths. Something as small as a "un" or "not" gave Hermione new hope to continue her research.

The translations were uplifting; however, they also alluded to one fact: Hermione needed physical contact with the artifact, needed to see it up close and personal. If she could only decode the markings decorating the sides of the arch, she knew that she would be that much closer to discovering the secret of the Veil, closer to answering her questions, and maybe fulfilling one of her hopes, her ultimate objective for starting her investigation.

She longed and feared unraveling the artifact that boggled the most brilliant minds for decades if not centuries. To accomplish something no one before her could, would be exhilarating, but…what if the answer was one she wished to never reveal? What if the answer destroyed her one hope?

Could she live with that?

Setting her shoulders and stiffening her spin, she knew that no matter the outcome, good or bad, she had to have a definitive answer. She never liked mysteries. Her constant curiosity sprang from a need to know, to discover the truth behind everything. She valued logic and intelligence.

She just hoped Fred was going to be able to deliver her package to the one person she knew could get her into the same room as the Veil.

* * *

Every time she arrived to this specific house, Hermione felt her heart rate jump to an erratic pace and her hands sweat.

The house, like all the others littering the street, contained the customary faculties of a suburban home. The front possessed well manicured hedges and neatly trimmed grass. Like its neighbors, the front stoop stood tall between two small flower beds sparsely littered with various blooms of vibrant yellows, oranges, reds, and purples. Everything in the front of the house was neat and tidy; the pride and joy of any hardworking housewife—or in the case of Number 4, Privet Drive, the avenue of escape for an alienated teenage boy.

Of course, it wasn't the house that made Hermione nervous; no, it was the house's occupants that sent her into a bit of a tizzy.

The occupants of Number 4, Privet Drive had caused Hermione nothing but an unhealthy amount of angst and anger for years. Their refusal to take care of Harry like part of their family ignited a flame of rage deep within her soul.

How could anyone put a child in a cupboard beneath the stairs? Leave him to drown in darkness and misery? Refuse to call him by his proper name? Not feed him regularly? Not clothe him properly?

Dumbledore and his "Greater Good" was rot. He should have never placed Harry with these people, wards be damned.

Suffering abuse by the hands of Muggles worked so well with Tom Riddle after all.

Violence begets more violence not tolerance.

Isolation was not the answer.

All these thoughts bounced through Hermione's head as she thought about her best friend.

Since her first meeting with Harry on the Hogwart's Express, Hermione had pondered the home life of the Wizarding world's savior. His modesty and annoyance towards the recognition his name brought him in his first weeks at school struck Hermione with a hard dose of reality; the boy clearly had no idea how important he was to their secret world. She herself experienced a momentary lapse into the fabulous Harry fandom until she realized that the scrawny boy with clothes too big for him and broken glasses was simply just another First Year. His magical prowess was no better than hers during her early observations. In fact, she was able to grasp the theories and practical concepts more effortlessly than the great Boy-Who-Lived. It wasn't until the fiasco with the troll did Hermione actually got to see a glimpse of the hero everyone else had labeled the boy as. The shiny hero title by that faithful Halloween however had lost most of its luster. Hermione was no longer blinded by the fantastic tale of the boy who defeated the darkest wizard of their century during infancy. After her rescue, Hermione simply saw Harry as Harry. He was just a boy with a lot of luck on his side; a boy that needed friends instead of a fan club.

Hermione strove to be the best friend to Harry that she could. She had failed in many ways. She was never able to keep him out of trouble, never able to curb his rashness and hastiness. Her inability to make Harry pause and think reached an epic level of failure in early June.

She was never going to let that happen again.

Not if she could stop it by teaching Harry self-control.

The first step in her plan was to introduce stability into Harry's life, stability that had to start at home. The Dursleys never provided that necessary home for Harry, so Hermione made it her new mission to change that. She had a sneaking suspension that the mythical wards Dumbledore insisted were protecting Harry during the summer months failed to keep the Dementors away for that very reason. Blood wards like the ones protecting Harry needed love to fuel them. There was no love for Harry within the walls of the house in front of her.

She had to change that.

She was going to protect Harry. She was going to bring love back into his life starting with this house.

But first, she had to knock on the door.

She knew she could not prolong the inevitable forever. No matter how lovely the wreath on the front door was, Hermione was going to have to knock so that she could gain admittance into the domicile.

There was no more avoiding it. The things in her hands were starting to get heavy. However, before she could jostle the items in her arms into a more comfortable arrangement for knocking on doors, it swung inward revealing the pinched and annoyed face of Petunia Dursley. The annoyance melted slightly upon discovering who was lurking on her front stoop.

Petunia Dursley, though wholly disgusted with all things magical, seemed to actually look forward to Hermione's daily visits. Of course, Petunia's favor was most likely dependent upon the continuation of Hermione's supply of her housekeeper's delicious yet healthy deluxe sugarless smoothies and cakes.

The bribes though seemingly small made a vast impact upon those living in Number 4, Privet Drive. Despite years of warning and multiple doctor-approved diet plans, Vernon refused to change the way he ate. The consequences caught up with him four months ago in the form of a heart attack and three blocked arteries. After coding on the table during his bypass surgery, Vernon began to admit that maybe it was time to start eating a more balanced diet.

Dudley, who took after his father's eating habits, was also in dire need of better nutrition. The boy was in danger of developing diabetes, which was a hereditary concern from the Evans' side of the family.

Hermione's supplies of treats were never-ending since Mrs. Kinsey, her housekeeper, loved to bake and was as much a sucker for sad puppy eyes as her father was.

"Hello Mrs. Dursley," Hermione said in the most pleasant voice she could manage.

"You're late," Mrs. Dursley replied haughtily, ignoring the greeting.

As she turned her head away, Hermione made up her nose and silently mocked Petunia, but quickly fixed a placid smile on her face when Harry's aunt turned back to close the door.

"Boy, come help your friend," Petunia screeched, continuing her ignorance of the girl weighed down with food packages before her.

Hermione was just glad Mr. Dursley was at work still, or she would be receiving thinly veiled cutting comments on top of her apparent invisibility. Despite Harry's insistence that the Dursleys liked her, Hermione always felt ill-at-ease with the minimally restrained hostility coming from the elder Dursleys.

A loud thump echoed through the floor as two sets of footsteps raced down the hall. Hermione knew by the noise that the reason behind the Dursleys tolerance of her was bounding down the hall alongside her best friend.

Using his girth to his advantage, Dudley cut the corner slightly ahead of his cousin and appeared in front of Hermione first. Dudley seemed to flounder for a bit as he contemplated what he should remove from her hands first so that he didn't up-end all of her load. Carefully, he lifted the top two boxes from the brunette's grasp and carried it into the kitchen.

Harry arrived in front of Hermione next rolling his eyes at the amount of food she insisted on carrying into the house alone. His annoyance subsided slightly when the heavenly scent of Mrs. Kinsey's famous fish tacos wafted through his nose. His mouth began to water as he liberated Hermione of the rest of her burden and followed his overweight cousin into the kitchen.

Hermione, not wanting to remain alone with Petunia, quickly scrambled after the boys silently cursing herself for letting the horse-face ninny bother her again. She really wished Dumbledore hadn't insisted on guards watching Harry this summer; it would have made kidnapping him every day much simpler. Instead of simply retrieving her best friend at her own convenience, Hermione had to work her schedule around certain Order members, those she didn't know too well and those stanchly loyal to Dumbledore. Luckily, Mrs. Figg could be bought with cat nip and fifteen-year old brandy.

Remus, Tonks, Kinglsey, and Moody agreed that the children needed to know how to protect themselves so agreed to look the other way. Well, Tonks actually wanted in on the training sessions and who was Hermione to say no. Having an Order member undercover with them wasn't such a bad idea in the long run. Never know when a Death Eater might pop up.

Hermione decided to leave Mr. Weasley out of her negotiations for available times to visit and extract Harry for the simple reason that he was a poor liar. She did not want Mrs. Weasley breathing down her neck and yelling things like "favoritism" and "being too young" around. Hermione did not need drama in combat training, thank you very much. Plus, that woman was a sure-fire way for Dumbledore finding out about her covert training operation. That woman and her mouth…

"Hermione." Harry's voice brought her thoughts back to reality. "What is this?"

"What's what?"

"This." At the tip of his index finger, Harry held up long silver chain with a strange type of amulet hanging heavily at the bottom. The circular amulet had a sort of crude snowflake design at its center with runes at the end of each of the flake's points. Harry could also make out smaller runes decorating the outer edges of the amulet, but for the life of him, he could not figure out what any of the symbols meant.

"Oh, that is for protection."

Harry sent a disbelieving look at the necklace. "How so," he couldn't help but ask.

Dudley paused in his unpacking of the food to listen to Hermione's explanation; she always explained things with such conviction and confidence that you just couldn't help but believe anything coming out of her beautiful mouth.

"I am really going to have to step up your tutoring sessions," Hermione mumbled to herself as she rolled her eyes. "Each rune around the star in the center…"

"That does not look like a star 'Mione…"

"…Protects against minor curses, hexes, and jinxes," said Hermione in her lecturing tone, ignoring the interruption.

"Seriously?" asked Harry, looking at the amulet with more respect and a tiny bit of awe.

"Of course. The writing near the edges acts as a locator as well as a communicator. Essentially, the amulet is like the coins from the DA, but this is a more advanced prototype."

"Hermione," Harry began slowly, dragging her name out. "Where did you get the necklace?" He already had a feeling he knew the answer but still needed to hear it.

"I made it," she said simply.

"You made it," he said with a mixture of awe and adoration.

"Yes." Hermione dropped her head slightly, worrying her bottom lip.

"Why would you do that?"

"Why are questioning me Harry? What is with the interrogation?"

"Hermione."

Dudley looked between the two magical teens completely lost and slightly intimidated. He knew Hermione was smart, brilliant even, but by the way Harry was carrying on, the amulet she made was beyond complicated. How did she even make it? He thought magic was prohibited outside of that school they attended.

Unable to hold in his curiosity, Dudley asked just that. "How did'ja make it if you can't do magic outside of school?"

"Hermione?" This time Harry's saying of her name was a demand mixed with a reprimand.

Hermione flinched slightly. Only three people could make her feel guilty about doing the right thing: her father, Remus Lupin, and her best friend. Harry didn't pull out the authoritarian voice often, but when he did, she couldn't help feeling like a little girl again sneaking a book under her shirt when she was supposed to be playing with friends not reading (of course she didn't have any friends, so she never really understood why she couldn't just read the book).

Clearing her throat, Hermione bit her thumbnail before replying, "I might have had some outside assistance with the actual magic casting."

"Who?"

She mumbled her answer.

"Who?" Harry repeated a little louder.

"Fred," said Hermione, cheeks tinted a light pink.

"Fred," Harry parroted, shocked.

"Don't act like that. Both of the twins have an astounding grasp of advanced magic. They are absolutely brilliant at potions and charms. Their transfigurations could use some work, but they did create a portable swamp, so even there, they are above par."

Harry couldn't help it, he laughed.

Sputtering, Hermione demanded, "What are you laughing at?"

She even stamped her foot like a five-year old not getting her way.

That only made Harry laugh harder.

"I hear happy in there," yelled Petunia from the living room. "Cut it out or get out."

That sobered Harry up. No point in pissing off the sleeping dragon, either of them.

"Whose Fred?" asked Dudley, his voice tinged with an edge that Hermione couldn't quite identify.

Harry could though and proceeded to roll his eyes. Dudley had about as much chance with Hermione as Malfoy had catching the snitch before him in a Quidditch match. Simply put: Never going to happen! It didn't matter that the Dementor seemed to blow a new personality into his cousin last summer. It didn't matter that he was actually starting to see Harry as a person and not a walking punching bag. Hermione had better prospects to explore especially after her little makeover over last summer. Her hair was tame now and in soft curls that hung stylishly across her shoulders. She decided that blonde was not her color and opted for to return to her original chocolate tresses. Harry thought she looked brilliant either way, blonde or brunette. But if he had to chose, he like his Hermione looking like well Hermione. Blondes may have more fun or whatever, but brunettes had more sophistication. Plus, it was freaky will all the attention his best friend got last term because of her new look.

That actually reminded him that he needed to keep a closer eye of who approached Hermione. He noticed some blokes checking her out during their lessons and that just wouldn't do. He'll have to remember to let Ron in on the plan once school was back in session. Harry didn't think Ron would like people sniffing around their 'Mione either.

"Fred," said Hermione, bringing Harry back to the conversation happening around him, "is a friend that used to attend the same school as Harry and me. He is also the brother to our best friend Ronald."

"You remember him Duddles. He gave you that bit of toffee that made your tongue swell," said Harry with a smirk.

Dudley shot him an ugly look for the embarrassing reminder before turning his attention back to Hermione. "Why would you need his help? It sounds like you've made one alone before."

Idiot, Harry thought. You answered that question yourself earlier.

"Well, I'm not able to practice magic for another month unless at school."

"Oh, right," said Dudley, scratching the back of his neck in embarrassment.

"So," Harry interrupted before Dudley stuck his foot in it further, "getting back to my question of why."

"Why what?"

"Why did you get Fred to make the amulet?"

"Fred didn't make it. I made it. He just added the incantations that I needed add…"

"Hermione," interrupted Harry

"The war's started Harry."

"I know Hermione. I was there when the gauntlet was thrown."

"Wait," Dudley broke in. "What war?"

"The Wizarding war," answered Hermione

"The one we have been fighting since we were eleven," added Harry

"Well, you've been fighting since you were eleven, Harry. I've mainly been doing research."

"You got promoted into fighting status years ago 'Mione."

"You know I wish you lot would stop calling me that. My name is Hermione. Her-mi-o-ne. It's not hard to pronounce."

"No but it is a mouthful."

"It's not that long."

"Everyone else had single syllable names."

"Ginny doesn't."

"But hers is a nickname."

"She only shortens it because she doesn't like her name."

"So?"

"I like mine."

"Off topic," cut in Dudley.

"Right," said Hermione. "Sorry. Dudley, were you ever told why Harry had to stay with your family every summer after he rejoined the Wizarding world."

"Because he has nowhere else to go." Dudley stated it matter-of-fact but there was a hint of uncertainty coloring his words.

"Because people wanted me dead," replied Harry dryly, used to feeling unwanted in this house.

"An evil man listened to some really superfluous advice and decided Harry needed to die so that he could take over the world," clarified Hermione.

"Delusional much," mumbled Dudley.

"Exactly, I mean if he would have just not tried to kill Harry the dumb SOB would have no 'destined' equal. When he dies, it will be of his own making."

"Great Hermione, I'll be sure to let Voldemort know that the next time he tries to light me up like a Christmas tree."

"I wish you wouldn't say that name Harry."

"Why? Dumbledore says that fearing to speak a name only gives it power."

"No, I just think it's a dumb name. I personal think we should just refer to him as Tom when we talk. That way less people will know who we are discussing, and he hates that name so it will piss him off that we are degrading him enough to stoop to calling him by his given name."

Harry paused, thinking over what she just said. "You know, I never thought about it like that before. Only the Order calls him Voldemort anyway. It's an easy indicator of who is in the resistance. Good catch 'Mione."

Hermione sighed but let the nickname go. She truly was getting tired of correct them every time they used it.

"Now, back to the amulet." Harry saw Hermione opening her mouth and cut her off. "And no more distractions or digressions."

"Do you know what digression means?"

"Yes, you've been doing it the whole time so stop. I'm on to your little game," said Harry, pointing a finger in Hermione's face. "I want a straight answer about this amulet. Why did you decide that I was in such dire need of one of these new amulets now that you couldn't wait until school started to make it yourself like I know you would have preferred and had Fred make it?"

"Fred only did the inca…"

"Incantations, I know. Now answer the damn question," demanded Harry in a fit of frustration. Hermione's stubbornness and tenacity is what had been keeping him alive since he was eleven, but right now it just made him want to shake the answers out of her.

"Because," Hermione started slowly. "The war's started."

"Hermione!"

"Let me finish!"

Harry crossed his arms but showed her he was all ears.

"After what happened last summer with the Dementor, I realized something…this house…the wards are not working properly."

Harry dropped his arms and was about to respond when Hermione cut him off.

"Listen to me. They work up to a point. You are cloaked when you are in this house, but outside of it…one foot out the front door…and you are a sitting duck. The only reason the Death Eaters have not come knocking is because they think the wards are keeping them out. Harry, I've been researching blood wards for years now, every since I found out about them saving your life and protecting you as a child. When Dobby almost got you your first strike second-year? That magic should not have even made a blip of the Ministry's radar. This house should be better hidden that Headquarters, but it's not. Ever since the Dobby-incident, the Ministry has had your address. Malfoy Senior could easily find it in their filing system."

Harry's eyes widened at what Hermione was telling him. If that was true, then he hadn't been safe here since he was twelve…if ever. If the wards didn't work, then why did he have to stay in this hell-house?

"Harry, Umbridge sent that Dementor because she knew your address, which should have been impossible for a place protected with blood wards, but to add to the impossibility, the Dementor was able to get close to you. Even with the ritual you participated in, your personal wards should not have been so low that the Dementor could get close enough to you to attack if you were within hundred meters of this house."

"We were just around the corner when that thing attacked," said Dudley absentmindedly, grappling with his own experience with that soul-sucking fiend.

"None of that should have happened with the amount of power your mother's wards should have been giving off. She invented them you know."

Harry looked at her in bewilderment.

"Did you never wonder why you were the only person ever recorded to survive the Killing Curse? It's not like no one before your mother shielded a loved one from death. So then, she must have done something special to cause the curse to ricochet, right? Your mother was brilliant at Charms, Harry. The intricacies of the wards she manipulated in the very real chance she would die protecting you are amazing. She had to weave a very detailed arithmatic equation coupled with extensive defensive charms to establish a trigger that would ignite blood wards at the point of her death. She must have been researching methods to stop the Killing Curse before she got pregnant with you, that is the only way I can conceive she was about to figure out such a truly history-making spell in such a short amount of time."

"My mother saved me with a spell?" Harry's voice was so low and tight that Hermione almost didn't hear him.

"Not just a spell, Harry. She invented a brand new type of warding. There is nothing like the blood wards on this house in existence anywhere else. They are truly unique. I've been studying the signatures, testing them every time I come over. The level of magic on this house, if it was at full capability, would form a literal force field against anything bred of evil intent."

"'Bred of evil intent?'"

"Anything meaning to do you harm in this house would run into an invisible wall. Nothing should be able to touch you." Hermione looked over at Dudley. "Well, nothing magical at least. I'm not sure how the shields should ideally work against Muggles."

"But they don't work?" Harry's voice was still low, but the emotion seemed to have bled out of it. There was a hollowness to it that gave Hermione pause. The last time she had heard Harry sound like this he was forced to compete in the Tri-Wizard Tournament. She knew he needed time to process all of this new information, but she also knew he wouldn't want to drag this discussion out.

Bracing herself for the meltdown, Hermione continued in a low voice. "No, they don't work properly. It seems something has tampered with them, some other force is keeping them from reaching their potential." Hermione cleared her throat. Here comes the hard part. "I think it may have had something to do with the amount of hostility present in this house. Like I stated before, I'm not sure how the wards were intended to operate around Muggles, but the concentration of anger, disgust, and distress lingering within these wall might be part of the cause for the short-circuit."

A sharp intake of breath reminded the two teenagers that they had an audience. "Because we didn't want him?"

"The wards were based in love. There is no love for Harry in this house."

"Did I have to stay here at all?"

Hermione looked down at her feet.

"Hermione," Harry snapped, scaring her slightly.

"No," she whispered. "With the way the wards work…no."

"No," he repeated emotionlessly. Suddenly, Harry punched the side of the kitchen cabinet with enough force to crack both it and his hand.

"Harry," exclaimed Hermione as she raced to over to him.

He looked at her with anger-filled eyes, eyes the color of a forest during a storm— dark, deep, and foreboding.

"All these years, I've lived here because I was told I had too. All these years, I've been treated like a lesser being, like a house-elf. And for what? What! Nothing, that's what. For nothing. I could have stayed with Sirius. To hell with the Ministry and the danger and running. I could have been happy. I could have had a family! I could have…"

Tears started to leak out of Harry's eyes and Hermione couldn't take it anymore. She grabbed onto her best friend, pulled him to her, and held on tight, refusing to let go, to let him feel alone any longer.

"Why," came Harry's muffled beseech. "Why do I never get to be happy?"

Dudley silently watched the intimate scene before him. He had no idea what most of the conversation meant, but he did understand one thing: Harry was no safer here than he was anywhere. He stayed here for safety, apparently sacrificing the place he did want to be for nothing. Quietly, Dudley left the room. He couldn't apologize for all of the hurt he caused but he could give Harry the privacy and space he needed with the one person who could make it better.

Harry's sobs sounded throughout the room, vibrating though Hermione. She could feel his pain with her whole being as she cradled this wonderful young man in her arms. He had been forced to sacrifice so much, too much in her opinion for people who refused to open their eyes to the reality of the world. Hiding was something the Wizarding world excelled at.

Hermione began to whisper soothing nonsense into Harry's ear as she tried to shield him from the world, from the anguish. She had always felt it was her duty to protect Harry. Now more than ever she wished she could just make it all better, take all the bad away. She couldn't stand to see her brave friend fall apart.

Eventually, Harry calmed and lifted his head from her shoulder, rubbing his eyes, cleaning away the tears. He looked deep into Hermione's eyes; he seemed to look into her very soul with his penetrating gaze. Whatever he was looking for, he apparently found because he pulled Hermione into another tight embrace, holding onto her like she was the last good thing in his life.

"You have to be careful from now on Hermione," whispered Harry into her hair. "I can't lose you too. I don't ever want to experience the feelings I had as I watched you fall again." He pulled her just a little bit tighter to him. "I don't think I would survive it."

"I promise," said Hermione, holding him as tight as he was holding her. The world stopped for the two teens in the kitchen of a Muggle home. They just held each other for as long as the other needed, silently promising to protect the other no matter what.

* * *

Time seemed to pass quickly after Hermione's reveal and Harry's breakdown. Luckily for Harry, Hermione had her supplies for their training sessions in her car already so she quickly took care of his damaged hand. There was no fixing the cabinet however. It had thin cracks in a creeping spider-web pattern imprinted on the side.

Surprising both Harry and Hermione, Dudley took responsibility for the damage. He insisted that he was attempting to show off his strength to Hermione when she hit the kitchen cabinet harder than he intended. He assured his parents that he was fine after they both began frantically looking him over for injury. He said that he would work to replace the ruined side if needed. The offer was refused of course. Dudley never did anything wrong so why would he be punished for the breakage.

When Harry tried to confront Dudley about taking the blame for him, he simple shrugged him off and mumbled something about owing him.

Classes that day were arduous at best. The only bright spot was watching Tonks try to balance on one foot with her eyes closed. Harry had been livid when Hermione initially revealed the presence of his protection escort, but he had to agree with Hermione, having someone who can freely wield magic was not a bad thing to have now-a-days.

As Hermione was getting ready to head back to her home, Harry felt a frantic need to keep her there with him.

"Wait." Harry grabbed Hermione's arm as she turned to open her car door.

"What?" Turning completely back towards him, she asks, "What is it, Harry?"

He gave Hermione an intense look, a look that she had a difficult time interpreting. "Just…be careful," he said after a time, knowing he was being paranoid after the day he had just had. "I have this…I just…please, be careful today."

"Have you had another dream that you forgot to mention earlier after all the craziness?"

"No, I just have a feeling s'all," said Harry, shrugging one shoulder.

Pulling Harry into a hug, Hermione tried to reassure her friend. "Nothing is going to happen to me. I'm going straight home from here and shan't be leaving there for the rest of the day." She released Harry and looked into his brilliant eyes. "I'll see you tomorrow," she promised, pulling lightly on his amulet.

"Tomorrow," replied Harry with a strained smile upon his face.

* * *

The anguish bled into her once again as she took in her surroundings. She could never escape it, never forget. The nightmare returned to her night after damn night. Swirling, suffocating, drowning her in unspeakable torment.

"What do you want from me!" Hermione screamed into the abyss surrounding her. "Tell me what to do," she sobbed, falling to her knees.

The dreams had been a constant for two months.

Two months of virtually no sleep, no peace.

All she sees when she closes her eye is black, oppressive black that repetitively sucks the very breath from her lungs and steals her heartbeat from her breast. People were starting to notice she was fraying around the edges.

She snapped at Dudley the other day over nothing. She just wanted him to stop looking at her like she was this amazing thing that he was in awe of.

She wasn't amazing!

She was a failure.

"I'm sorry," she said in a broken whisper, phantom tears running down her hollowing cheeks. "So sorry."

A gentle caress wiping away her tears jerked her out of her hazy fog of depression.

The touch was so heartbreakingly familiar and alien at the same time. She swung around franticly, attempting to find the origin of the touch but it was too dark. She could see anything.

"Know none of that, witchling," said a whispery voice from the darkness. A slight growl echoed around her causing her to jump.

"Who's there?" Hermione felt a chill run down her spine. No one had ever acknowledged her before in the dream. No one ever talked. Her heartbeat accelerated as she desperately pulled in air to her lung. She became very away of her vulnerable state in the dark. She had no wand and no senses to rely on.

"Guidance," the voice stated simply, hissing the end of the word.

"For what?" Keep talking so I can find you, Hermione thought as she continued to circle around blindly.

"Your journey has just begun witchling. Rough times are ahead. Are you ready?"

"I don't even know anymore," Hermione said despondently, dropping her head to her chest.

Hands trailed from her elbows to her shoulders and pulled her into a solid form behind her. She fought momentarily but relinquished herself to the figure when he only tightened his grip.

"It's always darkest before dawn."

Hermione snorted. Great, her dreams were spouting platitudes now.

"Recover your lost light," whispered the voice in her ear.

"How?" A begging note dripped from her voice.

"You need to get up now" stated the voice, ignoring her question. "Something's coming."

"What? What's coming?"

The air around her started to crackle with repressed power. She felt the figure behind her tighten its hold, digging its fingers deep into the skin of her shoulders. If this wasn't a dream, she knew there would be bruises there.

"Wake up!"

* * *

A crash sounding from downstairs jerked Hermione out of yet another restless sleep.

Her head dropped into her hands as she tried to grasp the fading tendrils of her dream. She didn't know what to make of it, but for some reason, it gave her a morbid sense of hope.

That hope turned bleak again when she heard her mother scream.

Grabbing her wand from under her pillow, Hermione attempted to extract herself as silently as possible from her room. A cackling laugh alerted her to the identity of the intruders before she even stepped into the hallway.

The Death Eaters had found her.

With that realization, Hermione did something she hadn't done since Cedric died, she prayed.

* * *

_Cliffhanger? Don't worry. The next chapter is in the works. I have actual words on the page instead of a simple plan. It shouldn't take me too long to get it up. Hopefully._

_I am going to try to regulate my updates better, but with classes starting back and my internship, it may be difficult. I'm not planning on a hiatus, so don't worry. There just might be a little lag time between updates. I will promise not to go four months without updating again though._

**Like it? Hate it? Let me know.**


	6. Chapter 5

AN: I know it's been a long wait and you want to throw things, but it was unavoidable. Class has to take priority unfortunately.

We will be getting back to...cue the music: _Hogwarts, because it's totally awesome_…soon, because I know you are waiting for it, but a few things still have to happen before school's back in session.

I would like to thank **Adryana**, **homicidalPEACH**, **Keira-House** **MD**, **kitten of a dragon**, **IAMAMANDA**, **Calisto Kerrigan**, **kataz**, and **Opalfire** for their wonderful reviews for the last chapter. None of my other chapters have had such a big response. Ya'll seem to like the Harry/Hermione bantering. I hope to bring it back in the upcoming chapters, and maybe another dream glimpse.

Hope you like the chapter. I am little nervous about the action scenes.

**WARNING**: This chapter contains disturbing and dark scenes that might not be appropriate for people under the age of thirteen (Yes, minors I am giving you forewarning. Please heed it if death and torture bothers you.) Also, some strong language is present.

* * *

Two month.

Two months of training, studying, planning. Two months of work destroyed by a preemptive strike by the enemy.

Hermione couldn't understand how this had happened.

How had they found her?

The Order had taken precautions. Her home was supposedly warded against detection.

As a matter of fact, there was supposed to be someone standing guard in front of her house like at the Dursleys.

Well, Hermione inwardly seethed, apparently not.

Bunch of lying, incompetent idiots.

If there was a guard though, she probably pulled the short straw tonight and got Mundungus. The thieving drunk would have high-tailed it at the first sign of trouble.

That settled it, she decided. If she survived tonight, she was going to have a lengthy discussion with Dumbledore about the importance of securing perimeters of targetable Order members and making sure they stayed secure. His record already spoke poorly against him in the matter of keeping people under his protection safe. To put a student in danger however was completely unprofessional and unbefitting his position as Leader.

Hermione continued to inwardly rant as she worked her way soundlessly down the stairs until a female scream broke her concentration, nearly sending her tumbling with its abruptness. Tightening her grip on her wand, Hermione noiselessly crept into the hallway. She took a deep breath, gave a mental thanks to her martial arts' instructors, and darted ninja-like down the hall to the den where the screams originated. Straining her hearing to estimate the number of dark wizards she was up against, Hermione listened to the muffled discussion taking place on the other side of the closed door.

"Where's the girl?" asked an eerily familiar voice that Hermione couldn't quite place.

The question was met with silence.

"Where is the girl," repeated the man, voice chipped and annoyed.

Hermione could feel her heart rate increase as the silence continued. Silence was not necessarily a good thing. Silence alluded to an inability to communicate. No communication meant incapacitation. Incapacitation was usually followed by serious injure or possibly death. Please, she prayed to any deity that would listen, don't let my parents be dead.

When the silence persisted, one of the Death Eaters apparently had had enough. "If you dunna want to tell us, we'll just look for ourselves."

Another scream sounded from behind the door. Hermione couldn't determine if it was from torture or desperation, a mother screaming to warn her endangered young.

Good, Hermione thought grimly with the scream ringing in her ears, if they can feel pain, they are still breathing.

"You two, check upstairs."

"Got it."

Hearing footsteps approaching the door she was standing in front of forced Hermione to slip further into the black shadows drowning the downstairs hallway. Her mind raced with plans of action. Each idea quickly discarded as too risky or too dangerous. Her mission was to get her family out of the house with as minimal of damage as possible. She didn't know how she was going to do that though with an unknown amount of people guarding her parents.

The clicking of the door latch jolted Hermione with a realization. The enemy was fractioning. If she could incapacitate the searching duo, she would have two less people to worry about. The only problem was that in order to not alert those sequestered in the den of her presence downstairs she would have to incapacitate the enemy silently. Silence meant close proximity and no magic. The slightest crack of the wood floor or wiz of a spell could cause her chances of success to plummet. Great, she thought warily, it was time to put all those hours of study into effect and see them in practical application. She really wished Harry was here. His dumb luck always seemed to get her out of trouble in the end. She could really use his luck right about now if she was going to pull this off.

More than luck, however, Hermione really wished she could unleash some of the spells from her hidden arsenal. There truly was no better time than now to test all of the spell theories she had been reading about then on the unsuspecting despots threatening her family. Of course, with the way things normally went for her, she would have plenty of opportunities for testing before the night was through.

Hermione redirected her concentration back onto the approaching Death Eaters and what was required of her to ensure her family's survival. Retreating further into the shadows, Hermione stilled her breathing and dropped her body into a preparatory crouch.

Her prey passed by her without a single glance in her direction. She almost felt sorry for the pain she was about to cause the unsuspecting men.

Almost.

Picturing her parents' faces strained in terror and agony reset Hermione's aims. She was going to send a loud message that just because she was muggle-born did not mean she was inferior. Pedigree meant nothing in combat only determination and skill, and right now, Hermione's very body hummed with the need to kick some Death Eater ass.

She watched as the two wizards slip off. One went upstairs to presumably check the bedrooms while the other cleared the bottom floor.

The wizard lurking in the same hallway as her seemed like a good place to start her offense. He was smaller than his partner and didn't remind Hermione of an American linebacker. No, by the slight drag of his feet and his jerky movements, her opponent seemed to be (at most) a grunt, unprepared to battle someone ready for an attack. The higher level operatives were most likely still in the den guarding her defenseless parents.

The best thing about silence, Hermione discovered, as she crept up behind the oblivious Death Eater, was that combined with home field advantage she could quickly and effectively incapacitate her opponent. A single hit to the soft part of his neck right under the jaw knocked the masked man to the floor, unconscious.

Hermione surreptitiously checked her surroundings, worried the noise from the Death Eater's fall had somehow alerted his companion to his need for assistance. When the silence downstairs prevailed, with the exception of the shuffling coming from the den, she knew no one heard the muffled thumb of the unconscious body hitting the carpeted floor. Hermione let out a relieved sigh. One down, one to go.

After tying up the fallen man with a nonverbal body-bind spell, the only spell she felt safe enough to breach the silence, Hermione let a lingering hope fill her as she thought maybe the use of underage magic in the vicinity of muggles would alert the Ministry to her home's invasion. She knew rescue at this point was slim, but she refused to let her pessimism drown her in dread.

Prisoner secured, Hermione dragged the man's dead weight into the laundry room before heading off after the man upstairs. She inwardly counted stairs as she crept up them to make sure she missed the ones that popped or creaked.

Reaching the top of the landing, Hermione momentarily closed her eyes and focused her senses as she tilted her head in search of the wandering criminal. The slamming of a door further down the hall signaled to her the invader's location. He was in her parent's room, two rooms and around the corner from her own.

Hermione began to slowly edge her way down the corridor mindful of every loose board and piece of furniture that could alert her position.

Her mindfulness of her surroundings and a need to be silent cost her dearly against the second Death Eater. By the time she arrived at the door to her parent's room, her magical foe was exiting. Hermione almost stumbled into him as she jerked herself to a forced stop. They stared at each other, judging the best course of action in gaining the upper hand.

The masked man attacked first. Wand in hand, he aimed a fired the first spell at her. Surprisingly he missed despite his point blank range for spell casting when Hermione bodily swung to the left. She capitalized on her momentum to kick out at the Death Eater's leg causing him to topple. Drawing her wand faster than she ever had before, Hermione quickly stunned the fallen adversary. She did not even take the time to hide the second man. She simply cast the same binding spell she bound the other intruder with before making her way back towards the den.

Wary that the noise had probably alerted the other's to their companions' struggles, Hermione resumed her soundless gait down the hall.

The third Death Eater had an advantage over the other two, he knew she was lurking in the house and used the same shadows she had been employing to his benefit.

She never saw the spell coming. A piercing pain in her left thigh momentarily stole her breath away. Feeling desperation clenching her stomach, Hermione blindly shot a spell behind her as she struggled towards the stairs. The limping significantly slowed her down, but she refused to give up. Her objective was still rattling around her brain: _save her parents, save her parent at all cost_.

So focused on her objective and moving through her pain, Hermione temporarily forgot about the man at her back. She simply knew that she had to get to the den.

No stranger to pain, the slashing spell that grazed Hermione's right arm did not even slow her pace as she continued to escape. The second spell that fell from her opponent's lips however threw her into the adjacent wall, knocking the wind out of her, and effectively stopping her fleeing.

"Gotcha you little bitch," sneered the faceless man, crouching over her prone and dazed form.

The Death Eater grabbed her by the hair causing her to whimper from the pain and started dragging her back towards the den where reinforcements awaited her arrival.

Hermione's left side throbbed from her knock into the wall and the slice in her leg. She could fell a trickle of blood leak from the corner of her mouth where she bit into her lip.

"I got her," announced the masked mince, yanking her further into the den amongst his cloaked friends. "Little bitch put up a fight."

Hermione took in the room as best she could with her neck pulled taunt in the Death Eater's hand. There were five other members of the masked brigade spread out in the den. They all had their wands drawn. All of them looked ready to defend themselves or cause pain at the slightest provocation. Her parents (still alive, thank God) sat slightly battered and bound in two chairs facing the ring leader of the ragtag group that infiltrated her home. Including the two she knocked out, there were eight Death Eaters.

Why were there so many, she could not help but wonder. Eight warriors against one young witch and two muggle adults?

Something wasn't right.

The opposing numbers wasn't adding up.

The self-appointed Dark Lord should have sent at most four of his followers to dispatch what he saw as a pathetic waste of magic. He should not have sent an entire team. Eight meant that he saw her as competent in the ways of magic. Eight meant she was a threat that needed to be taken seriously.

Full, experienced Order members did not even fight against eight to one odds.

"Hermione!"

She watched her father try to fight against his bindings so he could presumably rescue his little girl from the monsters that invaded their home.

She fought the one holding her hostage until she felt the cool blade of a dagger dig into the side of her throat.

"Now, be a good girl princess and I won't have to get your dirty blood on my nice, clean knife."

Hermione fell limp against her captor and arched her neck away from the blade.

Her incapacitation wasn't enough for her tormentor however. He tightened his hold on her and ground his erection into her lower back, while whispering into her ear, "I might have to overlook your filth before we present you to the Dark Lord. I would hate to lose a change imprinting myself onto your lovely body."

"Wilkes," one of the other Death Eater's barked, alerting Hermione to the identity of her captor.

The identity of her captor however took secondary precedence in her thoughts as she reviewed what had been whispered into her ear.

Voldemort wanted her alive.

The thought sent chills down her spine and made her feel nauseous as her stomach once again clenched.

Why did he want her?

She knew it was probably because of her close relationship to Harry. She would be perfect bait for the teenager. There were not that many people that would lure him out into the open. Voldemort had personally seen to the decrease of that specific number. The only other people close to the Boy-Who-Lived were protected behind the wards of headquarters. She was the easiest target, the easiest to acquire.

But something still did not sit well with her. Something in the Death Eater's tone, some wary warning sent her mind spinning with the other possibilities behind the snake man's actions.

"Before we leave, I think some fun is in order," declared the head sadist, already aiming his wand at her parents.

Simply capturing her no longer seemed to be their intention, for she could plainly see in their body language and stance that the Death Eaters thirsted to first cause the Mudblood pain before handing her over to their Lord. They decided to start by forcing her to watch as they tortured her parents.

One of the other Death Eater's raised his wand and aimed it at her father.

"_Crucio_."

Her father's scream bounced off of the walls as his body twitched and arched like an epileptic. Her mother's sobs joined her father's cries into a cacophony of torment.

Hermione's fingers clinched as her stomach began to roll. She should have prevented this.

Her father's pained yells echoed in accusation through her head long after the curse lifted. All her nightmares about unwittingly putting her family in danger drifted before her eyes in fast succession from one to another. None of them though touch on the pure torture Hermione was experiencing now. The dreams were always slightly blurred; the world was never quite bright enough, sound never quite loud enough. She was always able to wake from her nightmare recognizing that she had just experience one. She always knew that it wasn't real.

This however was undeniably happening. The slight burn of her tears against her cheeks, the scent of sweat and desperation in the air, the hard body standing unrelentingly at her back, and the bitter tang of failure on her tongue all bleed into a reality far worse than her greatest nightmare.

The Death Eaters took turns casting curses on her parents: the Cruciatus Curse, slicing curses, curses that caused boils, broke bones, and ripped skin. Each curse and cry of pain chipped away at Hermione's mind. She could feel tears leaking from her eyes unchecked. She screamed and begged for her captors to stop, reminding them that they were here for her and not her parents. All of her pleas went ignored. She struggled against the Death Eater holding her, ignoring the sting of the knife that she unintentionally jerked into the blade.

Hermione's struggles froze as she heard the two words that changed every life that encountered them. Two words that ended life. Two words that were aimed at her father.

Hermione had never seen anyone die before. Never seeing death while experiencing the taint of battle was something that she had always been able to brag about, at least in her own head. She never had to see a classmate or a comrade fall in battle—granted she was unconscious the one time death crossed the same room she occupied—never actually seeing the light vanish from another's eyes however helped Hermione retain some of the childhood innocence war demand as payment for her involvement.

Seeing the green light reflect in her father's eye before he collapsed to the ground like a marionette whose strings were cut broke something in the young witch.

She did not even consciously react to the stinging cut of the blade in her hand as she wrenched the weapon away from the man restraining her. She did not think as she mindlessly adopted the fighter's stance her instructors had taught her and rammed the liberated blade into her opponent's stomach before giving the knife a violent twist. She no longer cared about the sanctity of life as she felt the blood slicken her hand. All she cared about was sharing the pain that was invading her heart and holding it in a vice.

The one thought running through her mind was how she had to get her mother out of this house by any means necessary now. She was no longer pulling punches. Damn Dumbledore and his stunning rule. They were all going to bleed.

Pulling the blade free of the now slack body, Hermione spun toward the one who had original cast the spell and launched the dagger, her target: his chest.

Unfortunately, the blood from the first Death Eater caused her grip to slip and sent the blade off course. The knife barely grazed the murderer's arm before lodging itself in the wall.

Time seemed to stop as the Death Eaters continued to watch uncomprehendingly the girl before them dive for their fallen comrade's wand. They did not start to react until she unleashed the first spell knocking another of their number to the ground with a sickening crunch.

Lights flashed throughout the house as the witch they thought would be easily dispensed took her rage and pain out on them.

Everything seemed to work in autopilot for the young girl. Movement, reflexes, aims, hits, spells, everything danced in a blur of color around Hermione. Reality spun out of control as she cast a slicing hex at another Death Eater and watched his arm fall off.

Chaos consumed the room. Death Eaters scrambled for cover as they sent spell after spell at the girl at was supposed to be weak. The once eight strong contingent was now only fighting with four.

Hermione tightened her defenses with multiple shielding charms as she continued to rain judgment upon the scum that dared invade her sanctuary and destroy her family. The wounds riddling her body vanished from her conscious mind. She felt nothing but the need to hurt those dressed as death cowering around the den. She shot another damaging spell at one of the Death Eaters, sending him crashing through the wall into the next room.

In retaliation for his fallen men, the leader of the black brigade shot the killing curse at Hermione's still bound and sobbing mother.

The sudden silence was deafening. Tension filled the air, charging it, suffocating the enemy. Rage flooded Hermione's being making her spells more vicious yet less focused.

The killing served its purpose in discombobulating the witchling's impeccable spell casting.

Emotion fueled by rage makes a fighter sloppy. Hermione knew this, each one of her instructors told her this. Every lesson went out the window however when the second beam of green light streaked through the den. She fought like a feral animal, caged and injured, desperate for freedom.

Her concentration wavered as her spells became more and more erratic. The Death Eaters battered at her defenses, slowly crumbling her shields as her attention continued to shift. She became easily distracted by a single opponent, forgetting about the other two wand-carrying wizards in the room. The tactic served as an excellent moment for one of the Death Eaters to surprise Hermione from behind.

Nothing prepared Hermione for the Cruciatus Curse. Not her training. Not Harry's account of what happened in the graveyard at the end of Fourth Year. Not written documents of the dementia caused by excessive exposure to the curse. Nothing. Nothing could prepare her for the mind-numbing agony that finally forced her to the ground.

The spell caught her in the spine. Pain surged through her body, disorientating her, crippling her. Her back arched in an inhuman angle as her nerve endings simultaneously experienced the piercing assault of millions of needles. Hermione tried to bite back a scream but as the pain escalated it ripped out of her throat, exclaiming her anguish in the most primitive of tongues.

Over her screams, the Death Eaters yelled taunts and sneered.

"Not so brave now are you little lioness," mocked one of the remaining eight.

"You finally are where you belong you filthy bitch, on the floor, kneeling before your betters," jeered another.

The last Death Eater, the one casting the torture curse, smirked as Hermione's body continued to jerk and spasm even after he lifted the curse. "Pick her up," he finally said, kicking her onto her back. "The Dark Lord will be most anxious for her arrival."

The two taunters leered at the witch's prone form, reveling in her defeat.

As the two got closer, Hermione rallied her magic and ignited her secret weapon, fiendfyre.

The advantage the inferno gained her were short lived. With the combination of her weakened body and depleted magical core, Hermione could not control the fire. She had to release the conflagration or risk it consuming her in its flaming fingers.

The blaze swarmed around her, creating a protective circle of fire. Hermione's protection came at the sacrifice of the house. The wood floors were the first to be consumed. Fire spread like a winding serpent seeking its next meal and finding it in the curtains.

The Death Eaters scrambled out of the way of the hungry waves of charring heat. The forth man finally recovered from his journey through the den's wall abandoned the house, saving his own life by apparating out of the inferno while damning his master's suicidal mission.

Exhaustion zapped the last of Hermione's reserved energy, addling her brain. As the blaze continued to devour the house, Hermione mind reminded her of all the important things (books, research, documents, photographs, translations, etc.) in her room that she could not leave for the fire. Forgetting about the remaining Death Eaters, she embraced an adrenalin rush, raced out of the den, and bolted up the stairs.

Wand flicking towards her desk and bookshelf, Hermione concentrated on shrinking everything to fit in her school trunk. Shoes, shirts, and pants landed on top of the miniaturized contents of months of work and research. Sirius' Christmas present was tucked with her photo album of family memories. She crammed everything she could think of as shattering glass from downstairs reached her ears. She could not risk losing anything, not now. Not when another life was at stake.

She knew she needed to leave as she double checked her room one last time for anything else she might need. Satisfied that she had everything, Hermione casted the feather-light charm on her trunk before shrinking it with the last of her magic and dropping it in her pocket.

Hermione abandoned her room and raced for the stairs only to discover that she had spent too much time collecting her affects. The fire had spread throughout the house. Half of the stairwell had been destroyed, leaving a massive hole to large for her to jump.

She was trapped upstairs.

Loud crackling and snapping sounded above the terrified witch. All she could get out was a scream before the ceiling succumbed to the hungry flames and collapsed on top of her. Hermione instinctively jerked back as the roof beams plummeted around her. Roll as she might, she could not prevent the one beam determined to hit its mark. Leg pinned beneath the crushing debris, Hermione let out a pained grunt as all the air in her lungs escaped. She grabbed onto the carpet and attempted to pull herself free, but the beams weight shifted again as the wall crumbled trapping the girl helplessly to the floor.

The fire raged around her, surrounding her in a sea of blazing waves. The smoke slithered into her lungs, choking the breath from her. Her sweat was the only water combating the inferno.

Suffocation.

Instead of going out in a blaze of glory, it appeared to Hermione that she was going to die from smoke inhalation because of a stupid beam on her stupid leg. She gave one last valiant shove on the blasted beam before crumpling to the blackened carpet. The lack of fresh air and magic depletion was making it hard for Hermione to keep her eyes open.

The crackling flames seemed to taunt Hermione before her consciousness abandoned her the same way her magic did because she could have sworn her name was being whispered through the fire.

* * *

**What do you think? Review?**


	7. Chapter 6

_AN: Here it is guys; the chapter you have been waiting so long for. Sorry about the long hold up. I have a plan to utilize my vacation time and work on multiple chapters of this story to update with when I fall into slumps like this._

_Thank you all that reviewed for the last chapter and imparted kind words in response to the hiatus note._

_I also posted a soundtrack list to my profile if you're interested._

_Now, onward to the update!_

* * *

He hated this. He hated bowing and scraping at the knees of a man that was no more pure than he was. Everything pertaining to this great scheme of purging the Wizarding world of scum and inferiors reeked of hypocrisy and xenophobia.

When he was a young, impressionable boy with virtually no friends, stranded in the oppressive and hostile atmosphere of the dungeons, constantly ridiculed and mocked for not having the most hansom looks or the most money, the Dark Lord's ranks seemed like a dream come true. It seemed like a place he could finally grow into his own and show all his tormentors that he truly was something to fear instead of tease.

He heaved a heavy sigh as he took in the black capes and silver masks surrounding him. The ravel was picking up intensity as someone pulled a helpless Muggle into the center of the dark, dank room. Sporadic lights danced across the walls as spells hit the unarmed man, screams bled into the excitement permeating the air.

This was supposed to be glorious, inwardly scoffed Severus. This is what he had been led to want by his former housemates. This was the future he had been working towards.

Lying, manipulative, snake-faced egotistical megalomaniac, Severus silently muttered after refortifying his Occlumency shields.

It took the loss of his only true friend to really show the idiocy in his grand plan for gaining respect from his peers.

He let bigotry destroy the only good thing in his life, the only personal connection he had outside of his mother.

Lily.

That one name still had the power to send his heart soaring and his stomach plummeting at the same time. She had been his everything until one mistake, one stupid slip of the tongue, one visceral assault due to a moment of embarrassment after being demeaned had ruined it.

Even after fifteen years, she ruled his thoughts and garnered his actions and allegiances.

Not Dumbledore. Not Voldemort. But Lily, only Lily.

And as the man that killed her entered the room clothed in a dark robe that obscured his serpentine-face and illuminated his blood-red eyes, Severus clenched his hands into tight fists least he let his rage and disgust cause him to do something foolish like attempt cursing one of the banes of his meager existence.

Voldemort let the two soul-splitting words slip from his tongue to the barely breathing Muggle mangled on the cobble-stone floor, drawing all of his Death Eaters' attention to him.

"I have a mission for you, my Death Eaters," announced the self-proclaimed Dark Lord.

"A nuisance that has been a constant thorn in my side by interrupting the achievement of my ultimate goals has recently found her way into something that might be beneficial in our desire to acquire the Wizarding world and rid it of filth and putrefaction.

"Tonight, we make our presence truly felt by our enemy. Tonight, we strike fear in the hearts of the Wizarding world by hitting them where they are vulnerable. Tonight, we bring Harry Potter to his knees by relieving him of his Mudblood."

Severus braced his ears for the sudden glorious crescendo of jubilation echoing through the rather small chamber at the Dark Lord's proclamation. They always loved causing chaos and mayhem. It didn't matter that they would be attacking those weaker than them. It didn't matter that they were commanded to kill a child. All that those around him cared about were carnage and blood. Sometimes Severus even wondered if it mattered whose blood was spilled, muddy or pure, as long as some coated these monsters' hands by the end of the night.

He looked on with disquiet as the Dark Lord continued his speech.

"I have picked eight of you to carry out this mission."

Severus watched as the selected number grabbed their left arms—the appointment being communicated through the Dark Mark.

"I want the girl brought before me for questioning. Do what you will with the remaining trash."

Eight?

Severus knew that his shock was mirrored by all those around him.

He is sending eight after one underage girl? An underage girl that he wants brought back alive? What could she possible be involved in that would cause that kind of precaution? That kind of force?

Severus, in his long employment in the Dark ranks, had never heard of so many going after suck a small target.

"Are really so many necessary to capture one Mudblood, my lord?" asked one stupidly brave soul amongst the gathered masses.

"You dare question your Lord! _Crucio_!"

Voldemort apathetically watched the man scream and thrash at his feet. Once the curse was lifted, he sneered at the fallen man in disgust. "I'm not taking any chances with one of Dumbledore's pet projects. Now, go and bring back Potter's Mudblood."

He watched as the eight soldiers bowed and edged their way towards the exit.

"I want her mentally responsive," hissed Voldemort. "If she is broken before she stands in front of me, I will be finding eight new servants to replace you."

With a lazy flip of his serpentine hand, Voldemort turned to his right, dismissing those before him.

Severus turned, trying to keep his footsteps sedate and unhurried, to leave the latest ravel and report to the Order. He sent a silent prayer that his warning about Granger would get to the resistance fast enough to spare the young know-it-all.

He had almost reached the door when a voice stopped him.

"Severus, I have something I need to discuss with you."

Taking a deep fortifying breath, the Potion's Master turned back to his waiting lord, knowing that the night just went from bad to worse. A delay now could cost one girl her family, freedom, and sanity.

Bowing his head in submission and resignation, Severus kneeled before one of his masters.

"I want you here when the girl is brought in."

The silent command to stay within his sights needed not be spoken for Severus to hear it loud and clear.

"Of course, my lord," said the prostrate man, gritting his teeth through the discomfort in his knees.

"I figure a familiar face might make questioning her...easier."

Easy had nothing to do with it, Severus mentally sneered. He was going to rip what he wanted right out of the poor witch's head whether he was in the room or not.

No, his presence was needed to disarm the girl, make her realize the hopelessness of her situation.

"Will you be requiring some Veritaserum, my lord?"

The Dark Lord seemed to ponder this, weighing the pros and cons of the potion with letting his supposedly loyal spy out of his sight.

With a simple nod, Voldemort turned away from Severus, dismissing him like he had the soldiers earlier.

Severus bowed his head once more before rushing out of the room. He knew he had approximately five minutes to return with the potion vial before causing suspicion. He hoped it was enough time to also get the message to the Order. Action had to be taken immediately. The look he had seen in the Dark Lord's eyes did not bode well for the resistance, not at all.

* * *

The residents of the Burrow conglomerated either in the cozy but shabby sitting room or the small, cramped kitchen, clustered around the table that housed many glorious feasts of home cooking.

Looking up from his chess game with George and around to those gathered in the sitting room, Ron asked the question that was on several others' minds. "Where's Dumbledore? I haven't seen him in awhile."

Tonks lifted her head from the pile of files in front of her to reply. "Said something about buying crystallized pineapple," she said with a shrug, going back to her reading.

"Why?"

Sighing, Tonks looked back at the inquisitive redhead. "How should I know? He ran out? Had a craving? Is on a secret mission and the candy is code for something else? It could be any one of the above or none at all. Dumbledore keeps everything very close to the vest."

"He doesn't wear vests," stated Ron, confusion marring his face.

"What?" asked Tonks.

"He doesn't wear vests," repeated Ron.

"So?" Tonks questioned, abandoning her files to continue the asinine discussion.

"So, how can he keep things in an article of clothing he doesn't wear?"

"It's an expression," replied George, tired of the conversation and wanting to get back to the chess match; he wasn't winning but he could feel success within his grasp, all he needed was his brother to turn around so they could get back to the game.

"Well, it doesn't make sense," grumbled Ron, finally succumbing to George's silent demand.

Fred, absorbed in the latest WWW project specs, tuned out the dissonance of noise circulating his small corner of the family's sitting room. He could not figure out the next step in making one particular product work properly.

Talking to Hermione is the only course of action to take, Fred conceded, letting out a frustrated sigh.

In the process of finding the notes on the long-distance communication charms he knew were in the twin's prized Christmas product journal from Hermione last year, Fred jumped when a sudden forceful shout came from the kitchen.

Racing to see what happened, Fred came to a sudden stop in the kitchen's doorway, stumbling slightly when his twin and younger brother barreled into him from behind.

There sitting on the kitchen table was one of the two-way mirrors the Marauder's used to talk to one another while serving detention. The glow surrounding the mirror indicated that someone was attempting to make a connection to its mated pair. The only person that had access to the other mirror was Snape. Fred knew that he only ever used the device when something important needed to be relayed to the Order and he couldn't give the report personally.

The words that Snape imparted froze the blood pumping through Fred's body and stole the air from his lungs.

Snape barked only three words, "Get Granger now," before the mirror went blank once more.

Those three words stopped everything and restarted it in a flurry of motion and sound. The forceful yet panicked edge that replaced Snape's normal sarcastic drawl catapulted the Order into action faster than any encouraging speech that Dumbledore spewed before someone went out on a dangerous mission.

The commotion in the Burrow rocked the house. Orders were being growled by various people, predominately Moody and Lupin. Everyone was scrambling to come up with some type of plan, some contingency that could be proposed when up against an unknown number of assailants. Going in blind was never an option for a group as small as the Order of the Phoenix.

Despite the chaos, Fred's attention was diverted to where he could see his mother bodily blocking the doorway to the den—the closest room to the front door. At first, Fred could not figure out why she was standing in the way, preventing the Order from helping Hermione, until he saw his youngest brother making his way towards her.

Bloody hell, was the only thought running through Fred's mind as he made his own way toward the obscured doorway.

"Ronald Weasley, _where_ do you _think_ you are _going_?"

Mum's screeching is not going to dissuade him, thought the eldest twin, still pushing his way through the others, trying to get out the door.

"It's Hermione," his brother simply replied to his frantic mother's inquiry.

"No." She stubbornly shook her head. "You are far too young…"

"It's _Hermione_."

Fred, seeing that the argument was consuming precious time—time needed to rescue an outnumbered girl—sent a bolt of annoyance and anger through his very being. He was tired of this old fight. Sending a look towards his twin, Fred interrupted the argument that was gaining steam. "Ron, you're staying."

"What?"

George cut into the stuttering of an enraged and seemingly betrayed younger brother. "You're not ready to face Death Eaters."

"I've fought them before," volleyed Ron.

"And look how well that turned out," returned Fred. He knew that was a low blow, but they had to leave now. He did not have time to coddle his brother and worry about his feelings when someone he cared about was in mortal danger.

The stubborn tilt of Ron's head and the clenching of his jaw alerted the eldest twin to the longevity of the fight that his brother was willing to make, time they did not have.

Fred grabbed his brother and pulled him to the side of the small room. Ron struggled, cursing and hissing at his brother like and ill-tempered cat, trying to get away so he could rescue his friend.

"Now, stop it," grunted Fred, whinging from an elbow to his diaphragm. "You are only causing a delay in Hermione getting help."

Ron huffed in annoyance, but Fred could see the hesitant shift in his sibling's body language.

"Look, I know you want to be there for her, but right now you are just standing in the way."

Fred immediately knew that was the wrong thing to say by the straightening of Ron's shoulders, so he plowed ahead, refusing to let his brother interrupt his plea.

"We are wasting time, Ron. She could be seriously hurt by now."

"But, I can..."

"You have to trust me," begged Fred, desperate to end this argument. "I will get her out."

His brother stared into his eyes for what felt like eternity until finally, finally he sighed and nodded. "Ok."

"Thank you," whispered Fred, already turning to rejoin the other Order members.

"But," started Ron, once again grabbing his brother's attention, "you let me know the second you get her to Hogwarts through the coins."

Fred gave a relieved smile. "You'll be the first, promise."

Ron nodded and took a seat by the empty fireplace, rolling his DA galleon through his fingers.

Unable to continue watching his anxious brother, Fred strolled over to stand beside his twin, awaiting orders, knowing that tonight was going to be one of the most trying of his young life.

* * *

Remus Lupin surveyed the assembled people in front of him, mentally evaluating who were most important people to send where. He could already tell that everyone present was ready and willing to disembark to the Granger residence immediately, but he was also worried about Harry. This attack against Hermione would be another diversionary tactic from the Death Eaters to lure the boy out of hiding in an attempt to kill or kidnap him.

The first person he spotted standing closest to him that he knew wanted to go to Hermione's but was needed elsewhere was Arthur Weasley.

Remus shook his head, "No, Arthur, you, Moody and Hestia get over to Privet Drive. Harry needs to be extracted."

Moody grunted but headed towards the door without complaint, silently agreeing that the boy was going to want to be close by because his best friend has had another brush with danger.

Arthur sighed as if the universe suddenly landed on his shoulders and rooted him to the floor. Remus recognized the dilemma running behind the gingered man's eyes. This was about Hermione after all: the man's son's best friend. The girl has been labeled as family for years now.

Remus understood the hesitation, he really did, but the hesitation was impeding the rest of the team from getting to a little girl who was in way over her head. Time was of the essence, and Arthur's pause was unacceptable.

Growling under his breath, Moody saved the werewolf the need to reprimand his fellow combatant. "Move your arse, Weasley. Potter's not getting' here himself."

Lupin turned towards the Weasley matriarch once he saw Arthur make his way towards the front door. "Molly, I need you to inform Dumbledore what is happening the moment he gets back. Also, floo ahead and warn Minerva that we'll be bringing the wounded to Hogwarts so the gate will be open."

Seeing Molly's nod of acceptance, Remus turned the rest of the Order before him. "Be on your guard; we don't know what the situation is. Our goal is to extract the Granger family and contain the destruction as much as possible before the Aurors appear. Let's go."

With that, he turned towards the front door and headed to the edge of the Burrow's wards as fast as his werewolf speed would take him.

Apparating to the wooded area close to the Granger house, Remus could already sense something was deadly wrong. The sky, normally inky black with a smattering of stars, had an ominously cheery glow.

Hearing the cracks of Apparation behind him, Remus headed closer to his destination, mindful of the dangers surrounding him.

"Shit," cursed Remus, exiting the woods safely only to discover the raging fire before him.

"Remus!"

Tonks' voice rerouted his attention away from the house and to the sky, where the young Metamorphmagus was pointing.

"I see it," growled Lupin.

The Dark Mark drifted over the burning home mockingly, bragging that the reinforcements had arrived too late to. The damage was already done. It didn't seem to matter if anyone was alive in the house because Order members standing in the Grangers' back lawn knew that everything had changed. The war was tainting those they thought protected against the horrors of adulthood.

Disregarding the dangers presented by the flames, Remus plowed into the Grangers' residence.

Remus ignored the roar of the fire, trying to find the inhabitants of the house. Despite the crackling of burning timber, the house was eerily quiet. The haze of destruction inundated Remus, disabling his heightened senses, rendering him just as blind as the other Order members searching the wreckage of the house for one lost duckling and her family.

The one scent that did capture the werewolf's attention though was the heavy scent of death lingering in the air. The bitter taste of blood wrapped around Remus like a lost lover calling his inner wolf closer to the surface, begging to be set free amongst the beautiful destruction. Remus shook his head and ignored the Siren's call, swallowed hard to erase the copper ting on his tongue. He had a mission to accomplish; he was not going to let his baser instincts sway him from his course.

He looked over the bodies to make sure none belonged to his quarry before moving on.

Hearing faint thumping above him, Remus raced up what was left of the stairs to where he found her lying among the wreckage of her once home. The black ash melded with the blood across her face creating a type of savage beauty to his wolfish eyes. The cuts and smudges painted her skin like an ancient tattoo of valor and strength.

"Hermione."

The name fell from his lips in a pale whisper.

"Hermione," he yelled louder, still barely heard over the roaring of the flames.

He did not even realize he moved until he was kneeling next to her prone figure, assessing the damage littering her small frame. He could see her blood seeping into the carpet below her, indicating she had severe wounds needing immediate attention.

Casting a quick levitation spell, Remus flung the burning beam off of the young witchling's legs. The unnatural angle of her right leg added another injury to Remus' growing list of concerns.

Forgetting about magic, Remus gently lifted the broken girl into his arms, cradling her close to his chest as he made his way slowly back out of the ruined house. Edging carefully back towards the stairs that he climbed moments ago, Remus realized how dangerous it was to run into a burning building; his exit was gone; the stairs had caved in. Remus lifted Hermione more firmly in his embrace and took a deep breath.

The deep breath was a bad idea, though Remus, as he took in a lung full of burning smoke. Coughing and sputtering, the werewolf looked down at the destroyed stairs and to the witch in his arms. He could tell just by looking that her breathing was becoming more labored. She wasn't taking in enough oxygen and ran the risk of dying from smoke inhalation.

There was only one way that Remus knew of to get out of the house, but in doing it, he ran the risk of further aggravating Hermione's already severe wounds. Hopefully, a short jump would not cause too much damage.

"I'm sorry," he whispered into her hair as he Apparated out of the Granger home and back into the front yard where the rest of the Order appeared to be waiting.

* * *

Tonks turned when she heard the tell-tale crack of Apparation behind her, wand at the ready in case the enemy had decided to return for whatever reason.

She couldn't hold in her gasp when she spied an ash-covered Remus with a bundle in his arms. He seemed to be walking with fierce determination away from the smoldering house while simultaneously holding in, what Tonks figured, was the desperate need to cough the smoke out of his lungs and take deep breaths of fresh air.

Hurrying over to the werewolf, Tonks snuck a peak at the bundled-up package in Remus' arms. "Is she…"

"She's alive," rasped Remus, interrupting her question without stopping his gait away from the house.

Tonks could tell that carrying Hermione's deadweight was bothering Remus, seemingly tiring him out despite the werewolf stamina that she knew he possessed. "Remus, let me hel…"

Lupin's threatening growl interrupted Tonks. "I've got her."

Tonks withdrew her hands and lifted them in submission. She hadn't seen Remus look this feral since Hermione was last injured, and she had simply figured that was a combination of losing his best friend and almost losing the last link to friends long since mourned instead of the young girl now in his arms. The anguish and fury competing on the werewolf's face however did not mesh with her prior observation. Remus' eyes spoke of an agony born from helplessness, a helplessness that reminded Tonks surprisingly of the emotions she had witnessed flash across her own father's face after one of her more severe trips to the local magical health provider.

He sees her as family, as pack.

The realization struck Tonks right in her heart.

He's afraid of losing someone else he cares deeply for, possibly before he let the young witch know.

Though the epiphany of Remus' view of the girl just hit her, Tonks had on some level known about the werewolf's affection towards Hermione. She knew that Lupin saw himself in the witchling. They were both studious but knew when to put the book down and experience life. They both had difficulty making new friends or reaching out to other people, but once the friendship was established, they fiercely guarded those they held dear and took any failure to protect as a personal failing.

She looks so tiny, Tonks thought, observing the girl from a respective distance of the protective werewolf.

"Remus," begins Tonks, tone soft and calm. "Get her to Pomfrey."

Lupin's body seems to relax enough to convey his gratitude for Tonks' acceptance.

Tonks suddenly notices Fred running towards them, an orange and grey ball of fluff in his arms.

"I found Crookshanks…" Fred's words bled off as he stared as the battered and broken brunette cradled close to the werewolf's heart.

"Take him back to the Burrow." Tonks placed a comforted hand on Fred's shoulder. "And let the others know that we're taking her to Hogwarts."

Fred simply nods, never taking his eyes off of Hermione. He only moved after she disappeared from his sight with the tell-tale sound of thunder harkening her leaving.

He looked down at the bundle in his arms. A soot covered orange head raised to look back at him, meowing piteously, wanting to go with his mistress. "I know how you feel," whispered Fred, casting one last glance at the burnt shell that once held laughter and love.

He knew what he was supposed to do, what he should do, but taking another look at the meowing cat resting against his chest, he knew where he was going to go. He was never one to follow rules well anyway.

The resounding crack of his wake was lost amongst the hissing of the still blazing flames.

* * *

Ron continued to sit by the empty fireplace long after the Order members left, feeling inadequate and helpless. Hermione was one of his best mates. Sure she was bossy and opinionated and nagged about him never getting his homework done in a timely manner and goofing off too much, but that was just Hermione. He had learned a long time ago that that was her way of showing she cared. Yeah, it could be bloody annoying at the time, but he knew she was only trying to help in her own special way. The thought of never hearing her bossy voice again complaining about how "if he spent as much time thinking about Quidditch as he did his studies, he could give her a run for her graded" he was going to be lost. He did not know when it happened, but sometime between making fun of her in First Year and battling beside her last summer, Hermione had become his rock and his conscience all rolled into one. He did not know what he would do without her in his life, without telling her how important she was to him, how much he really loved her.

That was the real rub. If she did not make it out of this, he would never be able to tell her how he really felt, how he had felt for some time now.

Ron knew, on some level, that nothing would ever come from these feelings, hell they probably would fizzle right out if he ever got the change to pursue a real relationship with the bossy brunette, but he knew that he would always regret never telling her if she died.

No, Ron thought with a mental shake of his head, I will not think negatively. Remus will get there in time and save her. I have to be strong and think positive. Hermione would not want me to brood.

With that thought, Ron went back to staring at his charmed coin, willing it the light up with a message from Fred.

The coin did not light; however, the front door opened, ushering in the Order members that went to retrieve Harry.

It did not take long for Ron to notice that though these people went to get Harry, Harry did not come back with them.

The first thing out of Mr. Weasley's mouth upon returning was "Harry's missing."

Before the remaining members of the Order could get too stirred up over the news of the Boy-Who-Lived's disappearance, a voice called from the door. "What's going on?"

As one, every head turned towards the open front door where the previously missing champion of the Wizarding world stood, surveying the commotion of the Burrow with confusion and wariness.

It did not take long for everyone to jump start and crowd the teenager with hugs, slaps on the back, and light scolding for once again trying their nerves for not being where he was supposed to be.

"I was with Dumbledore," was Harry's simple reply to all the attention, still not understanding why those gathered were fretting over his supposed disappearance.

Deciding it was just another minor miscommunication between Dumbledore and the Order, something that seemed to be happening at a greater occurrence much to Harry's chagrin, he started looking around the room for his best friends. Ron was easy to spot, standing just outside the circle of adults, but he could not find Hermione anywhere, which was strange because Harry expected her to be there before him like always, giving his a huge hug as if it wasn't earlier that night that he had seen her last.

Shrugging, Harry turned his attention back to Ron, looking towards him for an explanation to Hermione's tardiness. The distraction of his best mate's countenance however gave Harry some pause.

"Ron, what is going on?"

"Hermione."

The simple statement of his other best friend's name caused Harry's heart to skip a beat.

"What about Hermione," questioned Harry, feeling dread and nausea cramping his stomach.

"Death Eaters."

The one word responses, though vague, conveyed the intended message.

"No."

Harry tried to turn around and head right back out the door he had just entered, intending to hail the Knight Bus or a cab or bloody run if he had to as long as he got to Hermione's house now.

"Harry," called Mrs. Weasley, forcing him to turn to her. He braced himself for more bad news. "Remus already took several others and headed to the Granger residence. They'll get her."

Remus was going after her, Harry silently repeated over and over again. The words gave him the slightest bit of comfort. He knew how much Hermione had come to mean to the werewolf after the summer where they spent a lot of time together, periodical letters, and spy sessions that were masquerading as guard details.

Before he could give anymore thought to why he should still be angry about said guard details, Harry heard Ron swear and drop a glowing coin to the floor. "Ron, is that..."

"Yeah," replied Ron, retrieving the fallen piece of currency.

Harry watched as several emotions ran across Ron's face, the most prevalent bouncing between concern and relief.

Ron looked up at his best mate. "They have her. They're taking her to Hogwarts."

Harry knew that his face mirrored the range of emotions Ron's did only moments earlier. The one thought that seemed to echo through his head was that at least they did not have to take her to St. Mungo's.

"Well then," stated Harry, "let's get going."

Ron nodded in agreeance and headed towards the fireplace in the sitting room that was connected to the floo network.

Dumbledore's interception should have been something Harry preempted. He knew the old man never let him go out on his own, that was one of the reasons he always got into so much trouble.

"Harry, you are going to need to stay here." Dumbledore's tone was calm but firm. There was no way to miss the direct order that lay behind the sweet smile.

"Like Hell I am," retorted Harry. He straightened his shoulders, preparing for a fight that he was determined not to lose.

"Harry." The placating tone rankled his nerves. He would not be dissuaded.

"I'm right behind you mate," declared Ron, already heading towards the den, where the fireplace was at, ignoring the physical distraction of Dumbledore.

"You are not going anywhere. Either of you."

Harry knew Mrs. Weasley was going to voice her opposition along with Dumbledore, but her opinion didn't really matter to him at the moment. She was not his legal guardian or caregiver, thus she had no say in the matter, and if she insisted on butting in where she did not belong, he would not mind telling her that very fact either.

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Weasley, but you can't stop me."

"Now Harry..."

Oh great, thought Harry. Mr. Weasley is going to try to be the voice of reason now. Well, he stewed silently, if he tries to stop me, I'll just...

"You can't go by yourselves. It's too dangerous."

Wait, what? Harry looked toward Mr. Weasley then Ron to make sure that he in fact heard what he thought he just heard.

"Dad?" Clearly, Ron couldn't believe his own ears either.

"You will need an escort," stated Mr. Weasley, like he was letting them go to the shops instead of giving the two teenagers permission to leave the safe haven of his house to visit their wounded friend.

"No!" Mrs. Weasley however did not seem to be as easily persuaded as the patriarch of the family.

"Molly..."

"No."

Tired of this argument, Harry turned his attention to finding a possible escort that would be willing to take them to Hogwarts. The room didn't house as many people as Harry knew belonged to the Order, but his gut told him that most of the missing members were with Hermione, rescuing her, protecting her, and for that, he was grateful that so many were in fact absent at the moment.

Continuing his perusal, Harry knew that any present, with the obvious exception of Mrs. Weasley—who was still arguing with her husband and son—and Dumbledore—who seemed hell-bent on Harry staying put, would be willing to take him to the school, but he honed in on the one person that he knew also wanted to be there for the young witch that seemed to burrow into the hearts of the strongest warriors with ease.

"Kings." Harry's voice was low and demanding, but the hint of desperation coloring the edges of the nickname could not be ignored.

Kingsley looked at the two boys in front of him and knew that if he did not take them, they would find a way to get to Hogwarts somehow on their own. He could not afford them sneaking out and taking a ride on the Knight Bus with Death Eaters targeting kids now.

Shaking his head in defeat, Kingsley simply said, "Let's go," and headed towards the fireplace.

He prayed to all that was holy that the young witch would make it through the night, because he did not want to be on the receiving end of the Boy-Who-Lived's temper.

* * *

**Like it? Hate it? Let me know.**


	8. Chapter 7

_AN: __**I want to thank everyone who reviewed for the last chapter and to those that have stuck around and offered encouragement**__. I am __**so**__**sorry**__ that so much time has gone past since my last post, but I have a present option for you guys at the end of this chapter. Now, my time has finally been freed up with school ending so there will be less time between posts. Your responses sparked a lot of ideas for some future chapters. I do take everything you guys provide into consideration, and if it works with the ideas I already have, it lets me know what you all want to see. I hope to answer some of your inquiries in the next couple of upcoming chapters._

_Happy reading!_

* * *

Minerva McGonagall stood proud and slightly disheveled in her tartan dressing robe and braided hair. The sight would have raised many eyebrows had anyone been around to observe the obviously anxious Deputy Headmistress of one of the most prestigious magical institutions in Europe standing outside of the front iron gates of said school. But the Patronus that awoken her earlier provided little to nothing in detail in regards to the need for her to open the school's front gates, so the professor's anxiety over the circumstances surrounding her jaunt into the night created on instance after another, each bloodier then the last.

The peaceful silence permeating the dark stillness surrounding the Transfiguration professor was interrupted by a thunderous crack reminiscent of the sounds echoed during an electric storm.

Appearing in front of the massive school gates was a ragged looking man with a bundle held tightly in his arms.

McGonagall unwound her previously crossed arms, and moved to intercept the figure hurrying in her direction. "Remus, what is all this...merciful heavens..."

The burred exclamation breezed past the rushing werewolf's ears. He ignored Minerva and raced through the front gates of the school towards the towering front doors. Time was of the essence. He could already feel the blood from one or several of Hermione's wounds sliding down his arms and chest. He knew that as soon as he relinquished his hold on her his blue shirt would look quite black.

Taking the corners faster than he probably should with a bundle throwing off his balance, Remus burst through the Hospital Wing doors with a resounding bang.

"Poppy!" cried Remus, his voice horse with desperation. Coughing, he tried to yell louder. "Poppy!"

He could hear a door open from the other end of the wing. Poppy appeared in a long well-worn robe and her silver hair braided down her back. She had either been asleep or preparing for bed when he arrived.

"Dear magical Merlin," declared the med-witch, taking in the sight of his burden, "what happened?"

"Death Eaters," growled Remus, gently lowering the injured girl onto one of the unoccupied beds.

"Sweet Circe, is that Miss Granger?"

In the glow from the burning house previous to their departure, Remus had surveyed Hermione's injuries and leveled them according to the type of transfer he could use. And while he knew carrying her as opposed to using a levitation charm was probably not the best option for her fragile condition, he weighed his decision on whether it would cause irreparable harm or not. He never took the time to fully assess the multitude of damage done to her body.

Until now.

Now, her injures were rendered in stark reality through Technicolor lights. With the wave of Poppy's wand and diagnosis charms, Hermione's whole form emitted some kind of color, indicating massive damage to her fragile body. Remus could hardly distinguish her milky white skin from the blood, ash, or hues radiating off and on her.

And when he opened his mouth, he knew that he was about to add to the med-witch's already severe burden of putting the young witch back together again.

"I had to Apparate, twice," panted Remus, afraid to let the words escape him, as if they alone could hurt the unconscious girl further.

Poppy paled at the implications of the werewolf's statement. Apparition—though the fastest way of travel in the Wizarding world—was damaging to a fragile body. The sensation of being squeezed through a hole put pressure on the heart and lungs.

For a body taxed with blood loss, spell damage, and smoke inhalation, Apparition could very well be fatal.

"I had no other means..."

Poppy interrupted Remus' mournful recrimination with a soft hand on his shoulder. "You had to get her here the fastest way possible."

Remus shook his head in shameful regret.

"Remus, look at me."

The command forced the werewolf to look away from the wounded child on the bed to the demanding med-witch attempting to save her.

"By Apparating, you saved her life. A Portkey would have caused irreparable damage and anything else would have taken too long."

Remus met Poppy's eyes.

"Plus, if she was not strong enough for the trip, she would have stopped breathing long before now."

They both dropped they gaze to the prone body before them. Her chest rose slightly, as if to prove beyond the shadow of doubt that it was indeed taking in oxygen, despite all of the statistical probabilities that would declare it impossible.

"You saved her life," whispered the med-witch, continuing to wave intrinsic patterns over the girl. "I can fix any accidental damage caused by transportation, I promise."

A tear escaped Lupin's tired eyes.

Poppy looked deep into the mournful man's stormy gaze. "I promise," she repeated, with more confidence then she truly felt at the medical feat before her.

Turning back to the prone figure upon the bed, the med-witch reassessed the spell damage before her. She knew, despite her reassurances, that the night was going to be a long and arduous one for everyone involved. She squared her shoulders and mentally readied herself for the challenge up ahead. If push came to shove, she could always contact her friend from St. Mungo's to assist her in the healing.

Merlin willing, Poppy sent to the heavens, it won't come to that. If the way the pacing werewolf was glaring distrustingly at a newly arrived Minerva was any indication, she didn't think Remus was willing to let a stranger in the room with his wounded charge.

"I can't reach Albus or Severus," panted McGonagall, as she meandered her way around beds to get to only occupied space in the room.

Before Poppy could reply, a speeding blear of pink and red arrived next to the still panting Transfiguration professor.

"How is she?"

"Is she going to be alright?"

"Is there anything I can do?"

"What's wrong with her?"

"Where's Snape?"

"Is she breathing? She doesn't look like she's breathing."

The rapid questions probably would have continued if the growling had not brought a new sense of importance to the already overflowing room.

"Back away." The raspy declaration contained the threat of painful retribution if the warning went unheeded, causing the new arrivals to slowly move away from the still bleeding witchling in front of them.

Poppy let out a sigh as she observed the looks of uneasy leveled at the aggressively hunched werewolf.

A long night indeed, she thought, as she resumed her work, attempting to fix what was visibly broken in her patient.

* * *

While Poppy valiantly ignored the rising tension around her to mend her charge in the safety of Hogwart's Hospital Wing, the three cloaked figures that caused a majority of the damage slowly slinked into the dark, expansive meeting area where Lord Voldemort held court.

The absence of the numerous black cloaks and silver masks in the cavernous room caused the figures' arrival to be noticed much quicker than they would have liked.

Sitting upon his dark throne, Voldemort acknowledged his returned minions.

"You seem to be lacking a few members of your group and requested one Mudblood," the Dark Lord purred, low and dangerous. "Would you mind telling me why?"

There was no missing the deadly threat resting behind the softly spoken words. The four people holding audience in the room could sense his displeasure at the turn of events, but Severus, who rested at the right of the throne, noticed something else present in the countenance of the Dark Lord, something sinister.

The serpentine man was smirking like he had won something, which made absolutely no sense.

Voldemort's triumphant smirk immediately set Severus on guard. His mind raced as he tried to decipher the facial expression. The mission had been a disaster. They had failed to return with the girl. Why? Why would he be _smirking_?

He silently railed and ranted trying to figure it out.

A single thought froze him to his very core. The sudden realization made Severus creatively curse not only himself and the Dark Lord but Dumbledore and the Order and even Miss Granger for putting him in this position of dying because he did the right thing.

It was all so simple. He should have seen it when he was asked to stay behind.

It was a trap.

Not for Miss Granger, of course. No. It was for him—a test to see where his loyalties truly lie.

Bugger.

Severus knew he was dead, but he refused to let anything play across his face.

If he was to die tonight, he would do it with dignity and not begging on his knees.

"Report," barked the Dark Lord, his eyes still resting on the Potions Master.

The three men looked at one another, trying to determine who should be sacrificed to appease the displeasured lord.

None were willing it seemed, because after two minutes of shuffling and staring, not one syllable had left the lips of any gathered.

The Dark Lord turned his attention back towards those before him. He knew that he could simply look into the simpletons' minds to receive his answers, but he wished to witness Severus' face when the verdict to the trial he had unknowingly been subjected to was released and he was found guilty.

"Well?" Voldemort's tone indicated pain would follow if his answers were not immediately forthcoming, so the figure on the right, the one that looked least damaged, channeled Gryffindor himself and signed his death warrant.

"My Lord, we ran into a complication and could not procure the girl," announced the man with a slight quiver to his words.

Turning back to catch the suspected traitor's reaction, he asked the question that would seal his fate, "Dumbledore's group?"

Severus reinforced his Occlumency shields and retained his default look of quiet distain. If he was to die tonight, he would not be damned by his own countenance.

The man cleared his throat, knowing that the words he was about to say was not going to be well received. "No, my lord."

Three words.

Three words were all it took to derailed everything.

Three words that no one in audience was expecting to hear.

So Voldemort did something he rarely ever did except to increase the anxiety of the victim that was causing him displease, he asked for clarification, because clearly he was hearing things wrong. "What?"

The man cleared his throat again before speaking. The quiver transforming into a complete shake. "No, my lord. It was the girl."

"The girl," repeated the Dark Lord, voice devoid of inflection or tone.

"Potter's Mudblood," stated the Death Eater, though the clarification was unnecessary.

Voldemort's voice rose, "You expect me to believe that one underage _girl_ dispatched _five_ of my men singlehandedly?"

"It is what happened." The reply was simple and straightforward, though full of trepidation.

"Show me," demanded the Dark Lord.

"My lord?"

Without responding, Voldemort plowed through the Death Eater's mind, searching for the memories pertaining to tonight's mission.

Severus watched as first one then the other two Death Eaters dropped to their knees screaming at the violent intrusion into their minds.

The strange turn of events however confirmed something for Severus.

Voldemort's ability to find sufficient servants in the purebloods had deceased since the last war, somehow undermining his power. His dreams of world domination can never come to fruition if he insists on pulling help from the lower end of the magical pool.

Also, his incessant desire and subsequent failure to kill a young boy spoke volumes against the Dark Lord's supposedly masterful strategic machinations. His unsuccessful campaign had now apparently transferred to the teenage girl-slash-best friend of the boy who he had yet to be able to kill.

It almost made Severus feel sad for the incompetence surrounding him.

Almost.

The fact that people still followed the sadistic madman was what he really found sad. There would not be a pointless and frivolous war that was coincidently unwinnable going on presently if these people could see past their lust for blood to witness the futility of it all.

Hate never leads to anything productive, and a stagnate gene pool only breeds idiocy.

Of course, he mentally pondered, it could actually be Miss Granger's magical strengths and not the insanity of his supposed brethren causing this failure.

But, he swallowed hard, that thought left a horrible taste in his mouth. He would not be able to scorn her the same way if that was true, and the only thing hindering her brilliance in his eyes had always been the fact that he found her obnoxious. If she managed to hold up on her own singlehandedly against eight trained Death Eaters, he would have to view her with some respect.

He could not in good conscience respect someone that he found annoying.

Damn it.

He was going to have to seriously rethink how he saw that little chit now.

Oh well, he mentally shrugged. If she didn't get him Crucio-ed tonight then he would internally keep his scorn to a minimum. That was all he could offer. He had a reputation to uphold after all. It wouldn't do for the snake-like man beside him to ever get the impression that he had gone soft over a Mudblood. Again.

No, that would definitely get him killed.

Turning his attention back to the men now writhing on the floor, Severus couldn't help but think that his mental redefinition of Granger was going to be soon in coming.

"Idiots," snarled the Dark Lord as he screamed "_Crucio_" over and over, alternating between the three men, one of whom Severus just noticed was missing a hand.

"How could you let one girl get the better of you," continued the enraged maniac.

* * *

A hissed groan stopped Ron's forward motion. He turned and took in his best mate's grimace. A stone settled in his gut. "Harry?"

Harry shook his head, his left hand rose to rub at his scar in an unconscious attempt to ease some of the pain. "He's not happy" was all Harry said as the trio continued down the corridor to their destination.

Ron could see Kingsley's quizzical expression and filed it away to discuss with 'Moine later, right after he told her that her recent brush with death took five years off his life but before he made some joke to ease the already building tension pinching his shoulder muscles. The list was actually getting quite long, now that Ron stopped to think about it.

But nothing was going to get striked from said list if they did not get to the Hospital Wing soon.

He had a best friend to see.

* * *

After the last streak of green light streamed across the room, ending three lives in a matter of seconds, Voldemort turned back to his Potions Master.

"Severus."

"Yes, my lord."

"I want you to report the girl's progress in Defense to me over the course of the upcoming school year."

Severus looked at his lord in surprise. Questions swirled in Severus' head, questions he knew better then to voice. "Of course, my lord. Should I also report her movements?"

"No, I will have someone else watch her between classes."

A chill went down Severus' back. You really fucked up now Granger, he mentally cursed, by grabbing the Dark Lord's attention.

"That is all Severus. You are dismissed."

"Thank you, my lord." With a quick bow, Severus swept out of the room, hoping he could make it to Hogwarts before the circus began.

He never could get any real work complete with animals circling the wagons.

* * *

Remus perched tensely on the bed adjacent to Hermione's, simply watching the witchling breathe. Because of his constant vigilance, the werewolf was the first one to notice when the steady breathing he was listening to shifted and became a struggling wheeze.

"What's wrong with her?" Remus sprang from the spot to hover over his charge's bed. "Why aren't the potions helping?"

Poppy's wand movements became frantic flicks and swishes. "I don't know. Something seems to blocking the healing magic from penetrating her skin."

"What?" Remus could not believe what he was hearing. Nothing could completely block magic like that. Nothing.

"What does that mean?" Fred demanded from his position on the bed across from Hermione's with Crookshanks in his lap.

"She's rejecting them?" questioned Tonks.

"I don't...I think...it's her magic. I've never seen anything like this. We need Severus and Albus, now," replied Poppy.

"Neither is back yet," whimpered Tonks, hearing the breathing shift once more to ragged gasps.

"If they are not back soon, Nymphadora, I'm going to need you to floo someone for me."

Tonks straightened up immediately, turning her attention to the med-witch. "Anything you need me to do to help, I'm game."

"Good, I need you to..."

Poppy's word died off when the rasping stopped.

She turned to Tonks, "Get Dr. Harper from St. Mungo's here now."

Tonks did not hesitate as she took off running for the door.

Poppy turned to Minerva. "Find Severus and Albus."

Minerva went the same way as Tonks, albeit slower, but only slightly.

A desperate whine pulled the med-witch's attention back to the bed before her and to the werewolf collapsed beside it.

Poppy rushed back to work. She refused to give up on the young girl before her. No one died in her hospital.

* * *

Hermione curled herself into the corner, limbs pulled as tight as possible to her body. She ignored everything around her. She no longer cared about the screaming and moaning. She no longer cared about the darkness or cold. She no longer cared about anything.

It had all become too similar, too frequent in her dreams for her to continuously be bothered by the horror that surrounded her while she was there.

She even ignored the figure hovering close by her side, waiting to be acknowledged.

She did not want to see anyone, but especially not him. His function did not hold true to his name. She just wanted to grieve alone in her little place in her endless nightmare.

"Come on Brown Eyes," said a familiar voice from the darkness surrounding her. "Don't do this. Your parents would not want you to die because of them."

Hermione continued to ignore the figure to her left, but answered the voice. "What would you know? You're not even really here. "

"Of course I'm here." She could hear the sadness aching in that voice. "I'm always here for you."

"No," she snapped back, "you left me alone. You left."

"You're not alone," he answered, trying to sooth, to comfort. "You have so many people that love you and need you in their lives."

"Yeah," she sneered, "for my smarts, right?'

"Hey," the voice shifted and came closer, still not in her line of sight, as limited as it was in the darkness, but closer than it was before. "You know that's not true. Harry loves you. You. Not your brain. Not your smarts. Just you."

She heard rustling and felt the displacement of the air in front of her.

"You promised to stay with him, promised that you would never leave while you were healing in that hospital bed the last time you almost died."

"How do you know about that?" She wanted to see his face, see his eyes, touch him, prove that he was real and not some figment of her imagination, but she just could not gather enough courage to lift her hand and reach out, could not risk it all being a dream. Her heart would not be able to take losing him all over again, not now, not after her parents.

"The Hermione Granger I know and care about is not a quitter. And she definitely does not break promises to her best friend."

"What about you," she lashed out. "You promised to stay safe. You broke your promise too."

"I was trying..."

She cut him off. "You lost focus because of me. You died because of me. Everyone keeps dying because of me."

She laid her head back down on her arms, losing herself once more in her guilt and pain.

"No." The voice snarled. It pulled at her heart, stealing her breath instead of frightening her like it would have anyone else, anyone not familiar with the pain behind the anger, the feelings of failure seeping through.

She felt hands wrap around her arms pulling her into a solid chest. She could help the sob that left her mouth. She dropped her head, burying her face into his neck, greedily taking in his familiar scent of leather and smoke. She twisted her hands into the lapels of his jacket, anchoring herself to him.

He was solid.

He was here.

He had not abandoned her.

He was here.

He was holding her.

_He was here_.

Hermione dropped all of her shields, everything fell, and she lost herself in him.

"I...I can't...I can't..."

"Shh." He rubbed her back and stroked her hair. She felt a light kiss on her neck. "None of this is your fault. Do you hear me? _None of this is_ _your fault_. I lost focus, yes, but that was my fault. Your parents died, yes, but that was because of the Death Eaters, not you."

She continued to sob in his arms, pulling herself tighter into his embrace.

"You can't give up," he whispered into her ear. "You have too many things to do, too many people who will miss you."

"People miss you too," she mumbled into his shoulder.

"But you'll fix that."

Slowly, Hermione pulled her head up. She still could not see him clearly, just his outline, but she already had all the proof she needed to prove that he was really there. "What do you mean? Fix what?"

She felt fingers run slowly down her cheek, wiping away her tears. He placed a kiss on her forehead. "You still have much to solve, but you will. You'll solve the riddle. I know you will."

"What? Riddle? I don't..."

"Shh," a finger stopped her confused speech. "I have faith in you." She felt another kiss and was once again pulled tight into his embrace. "You have to go now." He bent down and whispered something into her ear, something she could not quite make out.

Then she was alone in the dark with only the smoke and heat surrounding her.

* * *

Poppy rechecked the stasis spell she had placed on the failing witch, hoping, praying that someone would walk through the Hospital Wing doors soon that could help bring the girl back to life.

"What happened?"

No exactly who she was hoping for, but she would take anything right now.

"Mr. Potter, Hermione's condition is quite serious. She has..."

Remus cut the med-witch off. "She stopped breathing, Harry." His voice sound horrible and ragged with the smoke still lingering in his lungs. "The smoke did more damage to her system than was originally expected and something is blocking the magic necessary to heal her."

Harry moved away from Ron, who was standing next to his brother, desperately trying to hold his tears back as he took in Hermione's injuries for the first time.

In the rush to stabilize her body, Madam Pomfrey did not bother removing anything that was not hindering her attempts at healing, so all of the blood Hermione had lost remained clinging to her clothes and skin. Ron could not even tell where it was all coming from; he just knew that it was everywhere. She was covered in hues of black and red.

Harry dropped down next to Remus, hesitating momentarily before gently touching Hermione's dirtied hand.

"What are you doing to help her?"

Madam Pomfrey looked down sadly at the young boy that had too many pressures placed on him. "As of right now, there is nothing that I can do. She is somehow blocking the healing. I don't how or why, but I'm sure that it's her doing it. No spell could cause a complete rejection like this. Her body is treating the magic as a hostile invader and battling against it."

Harry looked brokenly down at his friend. "You said you would see me tomorrow and that nothing would happen to you. Mione, you promised. You said you wouldn't leave me alone. You promised."

He bowed his head over her hand. "You can't leave me. I need you. Please, Hermione. Please."

Harry's pleas changed to sobs as she continued to remain totally still.

Suddenly the hospital doors banged up and Severus stormed in with his robes sweeping behind him.

He stopped just long enough to take in the somber atmosphere before making his way to the crowded bed. He took in the hazy glow surrounding the prone girl indicating she was under stasis and turned to Poppy with a raised eyebrow.

"She's blocking the magic and has stopped breathing."

"Blocking?"

"Blocking."

"Hmm."

Ron who had been silent up until now rediscovered his tongue and lost his temper. "She's dying and all you can say is _hmm_. Don't just bloody stand there. You supposed to be a potion's genius so do something. Fix her."

Fred pulled Ron back down onto the bed beside him and tugged his brother to him, letting him cry on his shoulder without a single quip or joke.

"Open her eyes," declared Snape, choosing to ignore the redheads passionate outburst.

"What?" questioned Harry.

"Open her eyes," repeated with his normal level of distain.

Before anyone could move to do as Snape asked, a crash sounded at the doors.

"Ouch," yelped Tonks.

Fred was the only one to turn and watch the pink-haired witch limp into the room on the arm of Kingsley.

"Harper's a no go," said the female Auror. "He's on a business trip in some remote South American village to investigate the medicinal purposes of some root or herb. He's out of floo contact until next week. Sorry."

Kingsley helped Tonks onto the closest bed and then pulled up a chair next to her, taking in the action before him. He knew things were bad, but could not tell if they had the possibility of getting worse or better, so he decided to remain silent and out of the way.

"It doesn't matter," declared Snape. "Just open her eyes."

Madam Pomfrey did as told.

Harry dropped his head and continued to softly run his thumb over the hack of Hermione's hand. He could not look into her eye for fear that he would not see his friend looking back at him but instead a shell behind her chocolate eyes.

"Stubborn witch," sneered Snape. He turned to Pomfrey. "I'll need something from my stores. Keep her in stasis."

Without waiting for confirmation, Snape swept back out of the room, disappearing in the direction of the dungeons.

"Has anyone heard from Dumbledore?"

Tonks innocent question turned something in Harry's chest. "Not since we left Headquarters. He didn't even want us here." He did not even try to keep the bitterness from his tone.

"I'm sure he has a good reason for not being here."

Tonks comforting words did not sooth Harry's ire. Dumbledore should be here, if for nothing more than to find out what happened at Hermione's house tonight.

Snape reemerged with some sort of gold colored potion in his hand. He wasted no time with explanations. He simply tilted Hermione's head back, poured the potion down her throat, and slowly worked her throat muscles making sure that the concoction was completely swallowed without choking the unconscious witch.

The potion did not take long to work.

A harsh gasp jerked Harry's attention back to his best friend's face, hope and tears setting his emerald eyes alight.

Any lingering curiosity surrounding the contents of the potion Snape provided was forgotten.

All attention turned to the prone witch that was once more shallowly breathing.

"Hermione?"

"Sorry," whispered Hermione brokenly. "I'm sorry."

Harry sobbed into Hermione's hand that he clung to tightly in between his own hands.

She was breathing and that was all that mattered at the moment. He would yell at her when she woke up for scaring the hell out of him. Again.

He was also going to make sure that she one of the amulets she created permanently wrapped around her neck. He was not going through his again.

He was going to keep his family safe from here on in.

* * *

_The chapter was originally longer but I felt this was a good place to break it off._

_OK guys, here is the deal. To make up for the appalling amount of time that has been spanning between posts, I am offering you a present in the form of requests. By jumping to my LJ here—__**http : / vamp1987 . livejournal . com / 15449 . html**__—you will find a 100 situations chart. Just pick the word of your choice and who you want to headline in the piece. If you don't like the options provided, there are some blank spaces at the bottom of the chart so fill free to drop your own word. I think there are five blanks. Once a word has been chosen, I will lock your name into it. I will also send the story to you first before posting it anywhere else if you provide me with an email address. Drop your requests through a review to this chapter, a PM, or over at the journal._

_But be warned, it will probably take time to get the requests filled (you have seen my track record)._

_I hope this makes up for the five month absence and that the chapter was worth the wait!_


	9. Chapter 8

_AN: Thank you to everyone who reviewed the last chapter. I'm sorry I did not reply individually but ff would not let me for some reason. Hopefully I will not have a repeat with replying to this chapter._

_Sorry for any errors present. I wanted to get this update as fast as I could!_

_Just to let you know, this has been a chapter in the making for months and I still don't like it._

* * *

Feeling a presence to her left hovering over her body, the previously unconscious witch held perfectly still, employing tactics she had been taught throughout the summer to keep her breath regulated. The shift of air near her face however sent her instincts into overdrive propelling Hermione's hand to strike out and grip the alien hand reaching towards her face.

The startled gasp that was ripped from the person the hand belonged to sent Hermione into a momentary panic, causing her to automatically open her eyes and attempt to retreat away from the potential threat.

When she suddenly shifted, pain coursed through her body and jolted her into a coughing fit.

"Careful, your throat is still raw from the smoke inhalation."

Hermione turned to the voice and finally recognized the person who had been hovering was Madam Pomfrey, dressed in her usual white uniform. The young witch could not help but notice the circles lines the med-witch's eyes and that her normally coiffed bun was in slight disarray, like she has run her hand through it a time or two.

Hermione shifted her head to discover a worried werewolf sitting beside her bed, his hand still outstretched where it was holding hers moments earlier. She took in his appearance and noticed a matching set of bruised under his eyes, making his crystal blue eyes glow in the low lights reflecting in her section of the Hospital Wing. His complexion also looked a little paler than normal, causing his scars to stand out in starker relief. All-in-all, Remus looked like crap that morning sitting at her bedside. Clearly, he had lost what little sleep his was apt to get each night.

Remus handed the teenage witch a glass of water while Madam Pomfrey ran diagnostic tests over Hermione now that she was awake.

"You were terribly lucky, young lady," said the med-witch, her tone scolding and sympathetic simultaneously.

Hermione released an exasperated sigh. "I'm feeling the luck pouring out of my ears." Her voice scratchy from coughing as well as disuse.

"You were unconscious for a full week this time."

"Doesn't compete with my previous record," she said with an unconcerned shrug.

"You almost died," retorted the med-witch

"Had that happen before too."

Pomfrey rolled her eyes in vexation. "It's time for your next round of potions."

Ignoring the med-witch's movements and the watchful eyes of the werewolf beside her, Hermione began surveying the room that she was far too familiar with. "I hate this room," she boldly declared, looking from one white wall to the next.

"Miss Granger!" The scandalized exclamation of the med-witch was lost on the teenager. She continued to look around the room in distain, ignoring the bottle in Pomfrey's hand.

"Out of all of Hogwarts, this is the only room I truly hate being in."

"Hermione, I need you to…"

"Everything bad that happens to me causes me to wake up in this glaringly white hell," continued Hermione, disregarding Lupin's interruption.

"Miss Granger, you have to drink…"

Hermione continued to pay no attention to Pomfrey as well as Lupin as she carried on with her unimpressed mini rant about the Hospital Wing. "I think these walls are slowly going to drive me crazy. I just can't seem to…"

"Hermione, you need to take…" Remus voice broke off as he turned to see what had caught the young witch's attention.

Hermione grabbed the previously disregarded potion in Madam Pomfrey's outstretched hand and threw it at Dumbledore's feet when she saw him approaching her bed.

"Miss Granger." Madam Pomfrey's tone tensed her name into a reprimand. "Stop this nonsense. The potions are to heal your injuries not litter my floor."

Ignoring the med-witch, Hermione continued to glare at the Headmaster, silent accusations vibrating her whole being. She sneered at the regret and sorrow she witnessed in his soulful blue eyes.

Dismissing the old man, Hermione turned back to the werewolf determined to play mother hen and make her take the disgusting potions.

"I don't want them." The words forced their way past her clinched teeth.

Remus could see the pain vividly reflected in her eyes. She may not want them, but she clearly needed them.

"You need to take these potions so you can heal. I'll be here for you. We'll all be here for you. We're family after all."

"You don't want to be my family," replied Hermione in a dead timbre.

"Hermione..."

"I got my family killed! Don't you get that?"

That one statement was said with more passion and pain then anything the werewolf had heard leave her lips since her lashes blinked open minutes ago.

Her words pulled at his heart. He could smell the anguish in her scent, see the guilt in her eyes.

Remus could tell the young witch was holding onto sanity by a thread. Tears clung to her lashes, refusing to fall, and her gaze never wavered from her bandaged hands, clutching at her bed sheets.

"I failed them." The words sounded in a choked whisper from the girl on the bed. "I failed."

"You didn't fail." Remus' words were meant to sooth and comfort the grieving youth, but they were of no use if they went ignored.

Lupin looked at Pomfrey who had migrated over to stand with Dumbledore before pulling the privacy partitions closed around the bed, closing the witch's pain off from outside eyes. Remus sat on the bed next to the young girl and disentangled one of her hands from the sheets to hold it in-between his own.

"They died because of me, because I wasn't strong enough," whispered Hermione, tone hollow and vacant. She never acknowledged the werewolf's movements, too consumed in her own personal hell.

He could tell that she was back in that house, surrounded by Death Eaters, watching her parents die as she fought for her life. He had to find a way to get her out of that burning house. Remus knew he needed to try a new direction, a direction that would make her reconnect with reality, with the now, with him. He decided to try appealing to her logical side. "There were eight of them Hermione. Most would have given up against those odds."

She continued to ignore him. "Maybe if I had been faster, if I hadn't hesitated, I would have…"

"Stop it," said Remus, tightening his grip on her hand, trying to anchor her. "Don't do this to yourself. Don't live in the 'what if' when you could have done nothing different that would have saved them."

"You don't know that!"

"Yes, I do."

"No."

"Hermione…"

"NO!"

Hermione's yell brought Madam Pomfrey rushing back around the privacy partition. Though the screens provided a modicum of seclusion, they did not cancel out noise. She and Dumbledore heard every soul shattering and self-recriminating word that left the teenager's mouth.

Looking at the two of them, the wounded child and the helpless werewolf, drowning in their own sorrows and incompetence, the med-witch could feel tears begging to fall. Empathy could be a real bitch sometimes, and now was one of those times.

"Please…"

Ignoring Remus' pleas, Hermione turned her attention back to the hovering med-witch, who was desperately trying to rein in her own emotions over the girl's loss. "I'll only take the potions for major injuries. Don't heal anything that can heal on its own."

"If these wounds are not healed immediately, you will have permanent scarring," declared Madam Pomfrey in her most authoritative voice, the voice that made all students cower and immediately concede to her will.

The voice, however, had little effect on the numb witch starring sightlessly over Remus' shoulder.

"What's a few more to add to the collection," mumbled Hermione, laying back down and turning away from her audience.

"Remus..."

The werewolf cast a look at the back turned to him. "Leave the potions with me, and I'll try to get her to take them. Which ones are vital and which are superficial?"

The med-witch huffed in exasperation, but answered Lupin's questions, knowing that this was the only way to heal some of the pain that the girl insisted on enduring.

Once Pomfrey left for the second time, Hermione mumbled from under her blanket cocoon, "So, how long was I out this time again?"

Remus huffed. "A week."

"A week," Hermione repeated the words slowly, measuring them, knowing what it meant but refusing to give in to the emotions. "Do I even want to know the full extent of my injuries?"

"Probably not." The werewolf ran his right hand through his graying hair before wearily running it down his scarred face.

Hermione propped herself back up against the backboard of the hospital bed. "Will you tell me anyway?"

"Hermione..."

"Tell me."

"It's just going to upset you."

"_Tell_ me."

Before Remus could answer her, Snape burst into the room, his patent sneer marring his face and his black robes billowing in his wake. He took one look at the stubborn set of the young Gryffindor's shoulders and the line of unopened potion bottles on the bedside table.

"I see you are still feeling obstinate this morning," said Snape, his tone laced with disdainful mockery.

"Severus..."

"Those are not for decoration, girl. They are for consumption. Take them." Snape crossed his arms over his chest, ignoring the glare both the witch and the werewolf were sending him.

"Pomfrey nor Remus could make me take them. Why do you think I will take them for you?" Sometimes Hermione could not help but daringly challenge the authority aimed at her. Everyone likes to know their boundaries. How else would one discover them if they are not occasionally pushed?

"Because I for one have no problem with simply restraining you and forcing them down your throat. Asking you to take them voluntarily is simply common courtesy."

"And we both know how much you love adhering to common courtesy."

Hermione quip simply earned her another of Snape's patented sneers. Deciding it was best not to further push her luck, the teenage witch reached over into the collection of potions Madam Pomfrey indicated were vital and began to consume them one-by-one until only the superficial potions remained on the table.

She could already feel the potions working. Her breathing was getting easier and the pain in her chest and leg was starting to recede. Her skin also no longer felt as if it was on fire, and her shoulder began to feel as though it finally slipped back into its rightful place.

She knew that she should finish off the other potions, but she just could not seem to make herself reach for them, even though she knew that they would remove the rest of her pain, at least temporarily.

She knew she deserved to feel this pain. It was a reminder of what she had lost. It served as a punishment for what she was incapable of doing.

Seeing that she had stopped, Snape cast a look at the remaining bottles. "You are not finished."

"Yes, I am." Hermione had conceded as far as she was willing for one day. If he wanted her to finish off all of the potions, he was going to have to make good on his threat and force-feed them to her.

As much as he would love to enact what he had threatened earlier, especially as he took in the challenging glint in the young pain-in-the-arse's eyes, Snape had other things he had accomplish this morning, like planning how he was going to fulfill Voldemort's newest arduous task without putting the young lion before him in more danger than she was already in. He knew he was going to have to test her strengths in front of witnesses, but he needed to do so without making her appear as a real threat to the Dark Lord's machinations.

Being a spy sucked.

Huffing a put-upon sigh, Snape glared down at the reclining witch. "If I have to jeopardize my position as spy for you ever again, you will not appreciate the consequences."

Well, my nice thing of the year is now complete, thought Snape as he turned and stormed out of the Hospital Wing.

Before Hermione could reply to the comment, Snape left the room. She then turned to Remus.

The werewolf sighed and gave her a ghost of a smile. "That's just Severus' way of saying he was worried and get well soon."

The witchling just shook her head and decided to change the subject to something that would not annoy her after that abrupt meeting with the one member of the magical professorial staff that despised her.

"So, is Harry here somewhere or still with the Dursleys?"

"Yes, he's..."

"Right here."

Hermione turned to the voice at the entranceway of the Hospital Wing.

Harry stood in the doorway with his shoulder slightly stooped. His hair looked more disordered than usual and his green eyes were lacking the shine that she had help put back there over the course of the summer.

Hermione knew that this episode with the Death Eaters, while traumatizing for her, effected her best friend just as deeply though not for exactly the same reason. The attack brought back all of the residual fears and guilt that she had been actively combating since she got out of this room the last time she had been placed here.

She watched as he slowly made his way across the room. His steps determined yet weary. He seemed to have about as much sleep as Remus in the last week. When he sat, he forewent the chair beside the werewolf's to plant himself on the bed right next to his best friend.

"If you are trying to repay all of the times I sat waiting by your sick bed, you are well on your way," joked Hermione, hoping to lighten the mood while subtly showing Harry that she was fine without actually having to say the words.

"Why didn't you make one for yourself?"

The light mood Hermione tried to manufacture immediately evaporated with Harry's statement.

"What?" She knew what he asking, but she wanted him to say it.

"An amulet. Why did you only make one?"

"Harry..."

"Why?"

She rolled her eyes. "I promised...

"Promised what? To die for me?"

Hermione knew that Harry was about to blow. She really needed to find a way to change the subject and fast.

Unfortunately, Harry decided to change it for her.

"What's this I hear about you refusing potions?" He even had the audacity to look at the unopened bottles littering the table beside her bed.

She shrugged. "I took the vital ones. I don't need the others."

"Hermione."

"I'm fine. My pain level is nowhere near what it was last time. Trust me."

"That's kind of hard to do in this situation."

"What do you mean?"

"Snape had to give you a magic suppressant just to get you to start breathing again."

"And that's my fault?"

"Yes, since it was your magic actively stopping your healing."

"Harry, I was unconscious."

Remus decided to interrupt the bickering before one of the teenagers said something to the other while feeling of incompetence sparked between them and they said something that they could not take back.

"Harry, Hermione, you two need to stop. Harry, Hermione needs her rest and doesn't need you badgering her about her potions. She apparently has Snape for that. Hermione, stop intentionally winding Harry up."

Both of the youths had the decency to look sheepish until they caught the werewolf's quip. Hermione glared while Harry looked flabbergasted.

"Wait, what was that about Snape?"

Hermione waved her hand dismissively. "It was a onetime thing, I'm sure."

"But still..."

"Harry," said Hermione, her tone leaking with exhaustion, "drop it."

Seeing his friend tiring, Harry reluctantly agreed only after receiving a discreet look from Lupin indicating a full version of the story at his earliest convenience.

"Okay, Mione. You just get some rest. I'll be here when you wake up."

Hermione slumped back down comfortably into her bed and succumb to the sleep she had been fighting off since Snape directed her to take her medicine, hoping that for once since the summer began that she would have a night of uninterrupted sleep.

* * *

Because of her obstinance, Madam Pomfrey insisted Hermione remained in the Hospital Wing for three more days for supervised potion administrations. And for three additional days, the young witch only consumed the vital potions despite the constrain prodding from Remus and Harry while he was there.

Harry had left earlier that morning to join the Weaselys at the new Headquarters for the Order of the Pheonix stupidly based, at least in Hermione's opinion, at the Burrow following Fred and Ron's example from the day before.

Currently, Hermione stood before the adult who seemed to believe they had any say on where she would be spending the remainder of her summer and one who actually contained any type of authority over her future decisions.

"Now, for your protection Miss Granger, I need you to stay at headquarters for the final days of the summer vacation; that way you will be able to return with your classmates," announced a serene Dumbledore, ignoring the glare directed at him by the angered teenager in front of him.

"I'm not going to the Burrow," announced Hermione, hands hanging despondently by her side. "It's a stupid place for Headquarters anyway."

"Hermione," gasped Mrs. Weasley, appalled by her attitude.

"What? It is," she declared in that same dead tone. No fire, no spark. "All you have done is put the Weasleys in direct danger. Congratulations. I'm not adding to their future misfortune."

With that, Hermione turned towards the fireplace and grabbed some floo powder.

"If you need me, I'll be at the smart location."

She threw the floo powder down without calling her location and disappeared.

"She is getting very proficient at doing nonverbal magic," mused Remus before turning back to his companions in the room, rolling his eyes when he took in Molly's indignation and Dumbledore's attempt at stoicism in the face of Hermione's constant recalcitrance.

"Albus, I don't know what has gotten into that girl…"

"No Molly, she's right."

Molly Weasley turned towards the haggard looking werewolf in shock.

"We really are putting your family in unnecessary danger by having your house as Headquarters."

Remus turned towards Dumbledore with resolution in his eyes. "I vote you find somewhere else to hold meetings."

With that, Remus followed Hermione's example and left. Flooing to the one place he knew Hermione would deem safe enough to stay for a prolonged period of time.

Arriving in the dark study, Remus paused to catch his bearings. He let the silence of the house wash over him, having grown accustomed to the commotion of the Burrow. He loved Molly, really he did, but her house was too crammed, too claustrophobic for the werewolf with the full moon so close at hand.

Space has always been a luxury for Remus since his school days clustered in a dorm room with a hand full of other boys. Every full moon since his fifth year contained group jaunts in the woods outside of Hogsmeade and the Forbidden Forest. Throughout his school years, he only found true solitude in the library. Not that he was complaining. He would do almost anything to have the annoying chatter of his best friends nattering away in his ears while he tried to concentrate on the most menial of tasks.

Finally de-stressed enough to commence his search, Remus set off to find the wayward witch he had grown to care for as family. He didn't have to look far. Hermione was curled up in a familiar high-backed chair that had seen better days, situated close to the living room fire. A chair that had not occupied a body since its previous owner vacated it forever. Sirius' chair.

"I'm tired Remus," said the exhausted girl lying in the chair, apparently simply knowing he would follow after her as she didn't even pick up her head to see who had entered the room. "I'm just so tired all the time."

Remus hated this. He hated seeing someone so young grow up so fast.

"I'm happy to see that you we're able to follow me though."

A small grin trembled, aching to break free against Remus' weary lips. "Really? Why's that?"

The exaggerated eye roll was all it took to break Remus' restraint and a full-blown smile lit up his face, making him look younger, feel younger, despite all the hardships and stress that he had encountered in the last week.

"Dumbledore had to know that keeping things from Harry would eventually cause a backlash," replied Hermione, eyes still on the fire.

"Being forcibly ejected from Grimmauld after Harry unconsciously shifted the wards was probably not on his list of things that would happen," snarked Remus.

"Dumbledore knew Sirius left the house to him."

"Yes, but he was never briefed on the house's extensive warding."

"Whose fault was that?"

"Good point."

The room suddenly became quite again. The only sound was the slight crackling from the dying fire in the hearth.

"Nothing's ever going to be the same again, is it?"

The small, almost childlike whisper pulled at Remus' heart. He had never heard Hermione sound so vulnerable, so broken. He desperately wished he could promise her that everything was going to work out for the best, that things would get better, but he knew the truth. The world was slowly eclipsing into shadows, and they had to fight in the dark, senseless and susceptible.

"I missed their funeral." The hollow declaration shook Remus out of his silent morose thoughts. "I didn't even get to say goodbye."

Remus watched the young orphan curl into herself, trying to shield herself from the pain.

"I didn't get to say goodbye."

Remus hated the lifelessness lingering in Hermione's tone. He did not know how to heal her emotional wounds. All he knew to do was draw the young witch to his side and hold her tightly, reassuringly, letting her know that she was not alone, never alone. The girl called to his wolf, calmed him like she had since that faithful night in her third year when her howl awoke something within him. He now has an instinctive need to protect when around her. This melancholy atmosphere was agitating his wolf. He could feel him prowling in his cage, snarling his displeasure, demanding that he comfort and shelter the distraught girl, his cub.

At a loss of what to do, Remus lifted the underweight teenager into his arms and carried her to the one place in the whole house he knew she felt safe, Sirius' room. He knew that the dog had made her feel protected since defending her and her best friends against a crazed werewolf. The room still held enough of Sirius' lingering scent to cocoon Hermione in his presence. There at least she would get some (hopefully) restful sleep without any haunting nightmares—the same nightmares he knew she had been secretly suffering from all summer.

He was already mentally deciding what book to read while keeping guard of the young witch as he climbed the stairs.

Remus could tell it was going to be a long, uncomfortable night for him, but if it would help the sleeping girl in his arms even minutely, he would sit in the chair by her bedside all night.

He was not going to let her feel alone any longer.

He promised.

* * *

**Review?**


	10. Chapter 9

_Thank you all so much for your reviews because I have broken the 50 mark. A special thank you to __**waterflower20**__ for being my fiftieth review!_

_Sorry this update took so long. I ran into a small writer's block and got mildly discouraged. I am also in the process of posting "Operation" at Granger Enchanted (if you are not a member, you should definitely join. They have a very high quality standard—which I have discovered from experience—so you are assured to find good solid pieces) and the beta-ing is taking up more time than I expected._

_Again, I am sorry about the long time between updates in general, but I have no plans on abandoning this story. Despite my abominable lack of an update schedule, __**I will**__ write this story to its conclusion. Please, just bear with me._

_Side note: I know that the description for Sirius' room does not match the film. I actually wrote this before I saw Yates' version and changed some things from Rowling's version. (You will see what I mean.) I also have a few bits from "Yuletide Happenstance" here, but it is not necessary to read the one-shot for this chapter._

_On to the update!_

* * *

Hermione woke to the lingering scent of cigarettes, musky cologne, and something so achingly familiar her heart began to pulse to the same rhythm as her growing headache.

She shifted and buried her head in the silk covers caressing her body like the questing touch of a lost lover. Cocooned in the aroma of a fallen fellow, Hermione attempted to regroup her mind and ascertain how she found herself sleeping in Sirius' abandoned bed.

The answer snored lightly by her left side lounging uncomfortably in a wing-backed chair with a book collapsed across his slowly rising chest.

Hermione felt her lips stretch for the first time in days into an ease smile as she took in the slumbering werewolf.

She could easily see why Tonks literally falls all over herself when she occupied the same room as the ex-Defense professor. Granted, Tonks and falling had become synonymous in Hermione's mind, but there was just something about the sleeping man that drew the eye.

Maybe it was the werewolf thing. Animal magnetism and all that.

Grey streaks from a stress filled decade of isolation and virtual abandonment of all things comfortable, familiar, and home invaded the honey-wheat tinted locks that persistently hung in his eyes, conjuring an aura of mystery and exasperation simultaneously.

Even in sleep, he looked worn and wary. The lines marring his face from age and stress stood out amongst the scars lingering as constant reminders of the curse that haunts his every thought and action.

He probably put her here to stave off nightmares, Hermione thought fondly of the slumbering wizard. Too bad that nothing seems to stop her black dreams, not even the comforting scent of her favorite animagus while a werewolf stood guard over her bed.

Looking around the room Remus apparently felt would comfort her in her distressed state, Hermione let another grin sweep across her face.

Sirius really was rebellious in his youth.

While most of the house contained variations of green, silver, and black color combinations, the room she was currently in stood defiant in shades of burgundy red and shimmering gold. A mural of a huge male lion lounged on the wall facing the bedroom's door lazily batting a dazed snake's head. The colorful pictures, concert tickets, movie stubs, music lyrics from both magical and muggle groups, and prank schematics surrounding the painting revealed to Hermione that not only did the image act as a passively aggressive snub to anyone with Slytherin affiliations that should open the door, but it served as a type of trophy wall showcasing the Marauders many successful feats of mayhem and mischief.

Getting up from the bed, Hermione walked to the painting and gently lifted her hand to touch the nose of the lion. To her surprised delight, the lion shifted from his playful batting of the snake at its feet to shaking it in its mouth slightly before throwing the snake high in the air until it disappeared from the mural completely. The lion dropped it head to look right at Hermione and seemed to smirk in a hauntingly familiar way to Sirius before shifting its attention back to the snake that fell back into the scene right at the lion's feet. The lazy playful batting of the lion recommenced, waiting for someone to once again touch it so it could toss its plaything into the air again.

Continuing her journey around the room, Hermione had to admit that she was glad Sirius had decided to use the potion she made that reversed the permanent sticking charm on his rebellious wall décor. She did not think waking up to half naked biker chicks would have helped alleviate the pressure building in her head that morning.

The dark, heavy furniture felt clunky and oppressive in the room. They ate up too much of the floor space.

She always imagined Sirius needing room to move around and feel comfortable, so this room, the room he had been unwillingly confined to after months on the run and years behind bars, must have felt completely claustrophobic. She could barely breathe in the room. Hermione could only imagine how much worse it had been for the animagus.

She continued her exploration, stumbling across her school truck nestled between a large, black bookshelf and the door, bringing a touch of reality back to the young witch.

Remus must have brought it, Hermione thought.

In all honesty, she had completely forgotten about the trunk when she fled Hogwarts. She had just been thinking about her need to get away from everyone, to think without someone breathing over her shoulder, constantly asking her if she was alright or if there was anything she needed. Hermione knew that they were worried, but she did not need them smothering her with their concern.

She was not okay.

She was not going to be okay for quite some time.

But she did need to be alone.

Well, as alone as one could be with a hovering werewolf and a best friend with a hero complex.

Deciding to leave the trunk for now, Hermione walked back over to the bed and heaved a heavy sigh as she threw herself back across its rumpled covers. She looked up at the ceiling and could not help the incredulous chuckle that left her lips.

Sirius clearly decided some of the décor could come in use sometime down the line, she mused, as she took in her rumpled morning appearance in the mirror hanging directly above her.

Shaking her head slightly, Hermione carefully dragged herself off of the bed again and quietly made her way out of the room. It spoke to just how tired Remus was that not even the cracking of the floorboards disturbed his slumber.

Where to now, she wondered as she made her way downstairs.

Coffee.

The thing to help her headache, she decided, was the black liquid from the caffeine gods.

Finding the kitchen in the same order Molly reorganized it into, Hermione easily found the source of her morning breakfast and set it to percolate.

Hearing a creak of the stairs, Hermione realized that Lupin had not been sleeping as soundly as she thought.

A tussled Remus sat down at the kitchen table across from the teenage witch. He looked exhausted despite the fact that he had just awoke.

Hermione mentally calculated the placement of the moon and realized that his furry friend was to make an appearance in just a few days. She needed to go into the basement and make sure that the cage he insisted on using was still there. Maybe she could even pad the floor with some nice comfortable blankets. Does he get hungry when he changes? Hermione could not remember if anyone left food for the werewolf before his transformation. She wondered if the night would go smoother if he had something to eat and maybe some entertainment, like a rubber ball or squeaky toy. Do werewolves play with squeaky toys? They are a variety of dog, but how closely related are they? Would Remus be amused by finding toys awaiting him post-transformation or would he think she was mocking him somehow and be offended? What about...

Remus' husky growl interrupted her mussing. "How did you sleep?"

"Fine," Hermione lied, gazing out the window. She would have to continue her werewolf wonderings at a later time.

"Even with the midnight screaming?"

Hermione jerked her head towards the man in front of her. Seeing the look in her former professor's eyes, she did not even try to deny or plead ignorance. She decided to go with the truth, though a heavily edited version of it.

"I had a nightmare," said Hermione, shrugging. She occupied her hands by pulling down two cups from the cabinet above her head and filling them with the bitter brew. "Cream and sugar?"

Remus shook his head.

Hermione set his black coffee in front of him then proceeded to fix her own cup.

Deciding she had procrastinated enough, Remus asked, "And how often have you been having nightmares?"

Why was he bringing this up, internally bemoaned the teen. Turning to look back out the window at the morning sun shining through the curtains, Hermione could not help but curse the seemingly cheery outside world.

"Hermione."

The witchling sighed. "For awhile."

"Can you be more specific?"

"Yes."

Remus rolled his eyes at her stubbornness. He knew that she did not want to talk about this, about the times of night when she was at her most vulnerable and isolated, but he needed to know. He could not help her if she refused to confide in him.

Taking in his resolute stare and continued silence, Hermione heaved an even greater sigh, causing Lupin to crack a slight smile at her teenage drama. It did not happen often, but when it did, it forced the observer to remember that this strong, independent young woman in front of him was still a child in many aspects, even after the world and war chipped away much of her innocence.

"I've been having them for most of the summer."

"Every night?"

"No, not every night," replied Hermione, which was true. She did not, after all, sleep every night.

"What are they about?" asked Remus, almost afraid to hear her answer.

Hermione lifted her legs tight into her chest, hugging them close in order to make herself as small as possible. She did not want to talk about this, not after waking up in his room, surrounded by his ghostly presence. Clearing her throat, Hermione replied with one word, "Darkness."

Clear blue eyes captured whiskey ones, conveying assurance and security.

Hermione lost herself in those eyes and accepted everything they were offering. Deciding that she was done wallowing in her unhealthy lack of sleep for one morning, she asked the questions that she had been dreading since she woke up in the hospital wing a week ago. "What do I do now? Who is in charge of my future fate?"

Lupin sighed. He wanted to continue his inquiry about her nightmares, but he knew that she needed this as much as he did. Letting a small smile cross his face, he answered, "I am."

"What? How?"

"Your parents initially thought about appointing the Weasleys as your guardian, since they were the only wizarding family they knew, but they decided that they wanted someone who could operate in both worlds. They apparently felt I was suitable for the job."

"When?"

"The paperwork was filed in the middle of last year."

"Why?"

"Your parents knew more about the war then you gave them credit. They wanted to make sure you were safe and with someone you trusted. They also made sure that everything that was in their name became yours if the worst happened."

Hermione knew that Remus meant life insurance. There was probably also insurance from the house combined with the money left over from the funeral arrangements.

A deep morose thought filtered into Hermione's mind as she once again realized that her parents were gone and she did not even get to say her last good-byes at the memorial service since the Order apparently thought that going ahead with the arrangements to maintain Hermione's cover was more important than to wait for her to wake up so she could attend. Hermione personally believed that Dumbledore did not want to even give her the opportunity to be seen in public so made sure that everything was wrapped up neatly before she regained consciousness. If he had it his way, Hermione figured that Dumbledore would have let the Muggle world believe she expired in the fire with her parents, thus pulling her completely into the Magical world.

Apparently, Dumbledore did not have the authority to make that call.

"So you're my full guardian?"

"Unfortunately no, I'm your Muggle guardian, which means that you will live with me, but I have no say on the magical side of things."

"Because you're a werewolf?"

"Because I'm a werewolf."

Hermione carefully set down her mug, bracing herself for what was to come, praying that Dumbledore, in fact, did not have any legal control over her. "So, who is my magical guardian?"

"McGonagall stepped up and took that position. She will only be your magical guardian for a few weeks since maturation in the Wizarding world is reached at seventeen instead of eighteen."

"Does Dumbledore know?"

"Yes, he found out while you were still sleeping off your magical drain."

"And?"

"And he can't change anything even if he was inclined to. Your parents gave full consent. The papers are legal and binding. Not even the Minister can change this."

Hermione slipped into a contemplative silence, taking in all of the information she had just received. A hope and new sense of belonging began to overtake her. She was not going to be alone. She was not going to be abandoned or dropped off to someone she did not particularly want to live with. She loved the Weasleys. She did, but she did not want to live with them. She was an only child. Constantly being surrounded by boisterous noise and company was not something she wanted. The library was more than a room full of knowledge for her after all; it was a silent sanctuary where she could go and reacclimatize herself to a quieter atmosphere.

Looking towards her new guardian, she reiterated, "I get to stay with you?"

"You get to stay with me."

Hermione leaped from her chair and into Remus' arms, hugging him close and tight.

"Where? Where are we going to live?" asked Hermione, returning to her seat.

"Here. Harry was already letting me stay here; after learning about the guardianship, he extended the invitation to become a permanent move."

Hermione looked down at the mention of her best friend. She knew that Harry had a big heart, but she was knew, deep down, that had been envious of her parents, so adding her new guardian into the mix, a guardian that he should have now that Sirius is gone...

Her thoughts must have shown on her face, because Remus addressed them in his next comment. "Harry just wants the best for you. He understands that under no circumstances would Dumbledore let him leave the Dursleys. He is not blind to the machinations of the Headmaster."

At that, Hermione's head shot up.

"Neither am I."

Hermione felt a new understanding grow between them, an understanding that she had been cultivating with Harry all summer.

"Well," she said, changing the subject, "then we have a lot of work to do. This place is barely habitable. Everything is going to have to be changed."

"Hermione..."

"Remus, let me do this. Please."

"You're right," he said, nodding his head. "It is far too dark and depressing in here. The house needs sprucing, but it is going to be a very big job to fix this place up."

"Don't worry," replied Hermione, smiling a secretive smile. "I plan on calling in some help."

Remus raised an eyebrow in inquiry but received nothing in return. He huffed, taking in the time from the grandfather clock in the hall. "I have to go. Order meeting."

"Go. I'll be fine."

The werewolf walked over to Hermione and tentatively embraced her. With a small kiss to the head, Remus exited the room.

Hermione looked around the kitchen, pondering her first move, and she knew exactly what it was. "Winky."

A soft crack sounded to her left.

"Mistress, yous is ok," cried the elf as she threw herself at Hermione's legs. "I's tried to come sees you, but someone was always there, and mistress says not to be seen yet."

Even after owning the elf for almost two years now, Hermione still could not fully understand how it happened. One moment she was scouring the library for any and all legislation concerning house elves and the next she was the proud owner of one.

Proud was not the correct term, Hermione amended to her mental ruminations, more like tricked.

Hermione's elfish liberation dreams had evaporated with one visit to the Hogwarts' kitchen.

Sympathy for one particular poor creature caused her to become what she originally condemned.

But of course, after unknowingly binding Winky to her, the elf informed her new mistress that her grand plans for freedom would not have worked on the Hogwart's elves anyway. Apparently, one has to be the owner of the elf before the elf can be freed with clothing.

Hermione's overly kind heart and righteous indignation that propelled her to fight for House-elf rights in the first place forgot that part in her quest for freedom and equality.

It was a hard hit to Hermione's ego that she overlooked such a small but important aspect for her S.P.E.W. campaign.

"It's fine; I'm fine." Hermione tilted the elf's head up. "See. I'm right as rain."

The elf's demeanor changed so fast that it made Hermione slightly dizzy. "No, yous is not," admonished the elf. "Yous sit down now and rests. Winky will fix mistress something to eat."

Hermione batted off the elf's concern. "No, there is no time for rest. I have a job for you. A big job actually that might require assistance to complete it on the planned date."

The elf looked offended by the mere thought of being incapable. "Winky needs no help. She is a good elf. She does the work alone." The small creature crossed her arms in indignation.

Looking both sheepish and apologetic, Hermione adopted a respectful tone. "I know you are capable, Winky. I would never imagine saying or believing otherwise."

Winky loosened her arms, listening.

Seeing this, Hermione continued. "I plan to completely clean and redesign this house before returning to school in three weeks. I think that is too much work for a wizard, an elf, and a witch using Muggle methods."

"Why Muggle methods?" asked Winky, clearly not understanding.

"I can't use magic outside of school without getting into trouble."

"You can here."

"What?"

"Wards, Mistress. They block Ministry. Mistress can use magic here without trouble."

Hermione stood stunned. She chuckled to herself. Sirius knew but let her borrow his wand anyway. Sneaky man. He knew, even after a night of rule-breaking, there were certain rules she would not tempt and using magic outside of school after Harry's trial was one of them.

Getting back on topic, the teenage witch recalculated the work load necessary to fix Grimmauld into a livable space. "I still think we may need more help. Kreacher could not keep up with the work load, and even with a house full of wand-carriers, the house looks like...well, look around."

The elf turned up her nose. "Previous elf was bad elf. Trixy. House in ruins. Got around the bond somehow," mumbled Winky, as she began to shake her head in shame. "And wand-users not want to fix up house or house would be fixed."

"So," asked Hermione, agreeing with Winky's assessments.

"Two weeks," declared to elf.

"No way."

Winky looked insulted by her mistress's continued questioning of her abilities. "Planned right, skills utilized, two weeks."

Smiling, Hermione admitted defeat. "Ok, two weeks. Let's get started."

Hermione and Winky decided taking a look through the house was the first step, so they split up and took in the decomposition of a once proud manor.

When they came back together a couple hours later, the two started hammering out the plan that would consume them for the next two weeks.

So focused on the small being before her, the young witch did not hear the front door open and close. The one thing Mrs. Black's portrait was good for when it took up residence in the front of the house was the early warning system it provided. Who needed an alarm when one had a screeching painting spewing vitriol at anyone that opened the front door normally or attempts to sneak up the stairs unobtrusively?

But since the portrait had been relegated to the attic in a soundproofed pine crate, Remus received a banishment charm into the entrance way wall by a very protective house elf.

"Winky, no."

Disoriented, all Remus could concentrate on were heavy footsteps coming in his direction and the pain littering his body.

"Remus, I am so sorry. You startled her."

"I's is so sorry, mister."

"No punishment, Winky. It was an accident. Please, go get some ice for his head."

Lupin's eyes began to clear as Hermione helped him back to his feet.

"Hermione, was that...?"

Seeing his confusion, she gave a rushed response as she led him into the parlor. "Yes. I have an elf. Long story."

"One," he began as Hermione helped him sit on the couch, "that you are going to share with me in the near future."

"Promise," replied the witch, handing Remus bag of ice for his head that Winky had popped in with. "So, short meeting?"

The werewolf huffed a laugh at her poor attempt at directing his attention away from the small addition to the household. "Slow week apparently. Voldemort and his minions are being quiet for now. Probably still reeling from last week." Remus silently cursed himself for his end remark as he watched Hermione's stance tense as tight as a bow string before his eyes. He hated that blank look behind her whiskey irises. "Hermione, I'm sorry. What I meant was..."

Hermione waved off his excuses like she would one of the boys' diversionary quips. "It's fine. Continue."

"After the meeting, the discussion became centered on you."

"Me?"

"Apparently Molly did not appreciate your brush off yesterday."

"She can get over it."

"Agreed."

Deciding to change the subject once more, Hermione informed Remus about the plan she established with Winky, after letting him in on the details behind Winky's origins and new bonding.

They shared a quick lunch of sandwiches before getting down to work.

"Ok Winky," started Hermione. "I want you to strip all of the rooms bare and place everything in the largest room in this house."

"Everything?"

"Everything. Every piece of furniture, clothing, and knick knack," declared Hermione, as she walked over to the door leading to the entranceway. Slowly she turned back towards the waiting house elf. "Except for the first room on the right on the fourth floor. I want you to leave that one alone for now."

Hermione could see Remus drop his head slightly at her cleaning exception. She knew that they both needed that room to remain untouched for a little while longer.

"Do you want me to add it then to the stuff in the ballroom?"

"What stuff?" asked Hermione.

"What ballroom?" inquired Remus, a look of confusion clouding his face. As far as he knew, Grimmauld Place did not have a ballroom, or at least Sirius never mentioned it having one.

"The ballroom upstairs on the other side of the manor."

"Other side?" asked Remus and Hermione together.

"Yes. Other side was locked before but new master opened it back up. All of the lost stuff returned home. In the ballroom now it is."

Hermione and Remus looked at each other. This changed the plan slightly. "Show me," said the witch.

Instead of walking, Winky grabbed both of their hands and popped them into the newly discovered space.

The ballroom was huge and could easily hold up to two hundred people. It was also dirty. There were cobwebs hanging in the corners of the room, across the drapery surrounding hidden windows, devouring the chandeliers, and covering the dozen of tables littered throughout the room. The floor was coated with a thick layer of dust and grim.

The only place in the room not consumed by time was a rather large pile of stuff in the center of the room.

"Winky, do you know where this stuff came from?"

"It was returned, Mistress."

"What do you mean?" asked Remus as he began visually shifting through the items, knowing that his first task was going to be making them safe.

"Everything stolen was returned," stated the elf simply.

Hermione finally understood. "Mundungus. Everything he stole returned when Harry reset the wards. The Blacks must have been so paranoid that they spelled all of their possessions in case of theft." Chuckling slight, she continued with, "I bet that drunk got a nasty surprise when the spells activated too. I don't imagine the Blacks being lenient on thieves."

"I concur that it could have been nothing good," declared Remus, casting a few revealing spells and detectors over the pile of recovered items. While they were in Mundungus' care, these items seemed benign, but with the new wards, who knew what could have been reawakened. With that thought, the werewolf turned to his companion. "Everything should be checked for spells and curses."

Nodding her agreement, Hermione turned back to Winky. "Ok, the plan still holds that I want everything in the house in this room. We'll go from there once that is finished."

She turned back to Remus. "Is transportation by elf-magic safe, do you think?"

"Since the Blacks did not give any credence to magic outside of wand-magic, no spells should be geared towards elves." He looked down at the small creature. "Be very careful when you banish though. I know elves have brilliant revealing magic, but it is better to be safe than sorry."

"Oh, but leave the books alone in the library." Turning to Remus, she asked, "Do you mind going through them?"

Remus shook his head, already making plans for what he could do in the library to make it safe.

Winky bowed before clicking her fingers and disappearing.

Pieces of furniture that Hermione could identify as coming from the first floor study immediately began popping into the room.

Tying her hair back with the band on her wrist, Hermione pulled out her wand and got to work with the spells Remus advised her to use, while he continued to evaluate the pile before him.

* * *

After Winky zapped everything in the manor into the ballroom, Hermione and Remus took a few days to sort everything out. Hermione focused on sorting through all of the furniture, determining what could be salvaged from the dark jumble of cherry, mahogany, chocolate, and black woods and what needed to be either tossed or transfigured.

Some pieces required a hefty amount of sanding, staining, wood varnish, and elbow grease, but in the end, Hermione was able to resituate the manor's rooms with the newly refurbished antique furniture.

The gaudy decorative accessories and grotesque knick-knack littering the room on the other hand, especially the items plagued with dark magic or containing pieces of once living beings, found themselves situated into a pile awaiting either the attic or the trash heap.

Hermione could not help but wonder if the Magical world believed in yard sales.

* * *

The first task befalling the former-Defense against the Dark Arts professor was to shift through the pile of returned artifacts that had been stolen from the enchanted house. He knew that Molly had roped the Order members into go through the house previously and remove any dark curses lingering on the items surrounding her family and surrogates.

The items in the pile were mainly small items that one could hide in pockets or bags: candle sticks, books, jewelry, small weapons, etc. Some of the items clearly had dark magic surrounding them, but there did not seem to be any triggers for anything but thieves on them. He decided to leave them in a pile to be resorted through later and continued scanning the other items in the ballroom for dangerous curses.

After completing his task to rid the room of dark magic triggers, Remus mentally fortified himself for the arduous task ahead of him, sorting through the library. He collected all of the books lingering by his feet with a simple levitation spell and made his way back downstairs.

The library became Lupin's brainchild. All of the books were carefully removed from the shelves and sorted into piles by subject matter. All of the dark volumes that had been returned from Molly's cleansing (because the wards apparently saw that as a type of theft) were put in the very back corner of the room so that Remus would not accidently trip over them and cause irreparable damage to himself.

Once everything was sorted, the werewolf began to slowly put the books back on the newly cleaned and polished shelves. The last books to be replaced were the dark ones. They were each carefully levitated into their slots. Once everyone was shelved, a thick sheet of conjured glass was magicked to encase them. Remus set a series of complicated runes and protection spells around and on the glass to make sure that no one could get to the books behind it without the correct incantation.

* * *

Days passed in a blur of dusting, sweeping, and stripping wallpaper after the furniture and library were finished.

Like Hermione planned, only one room remained untouched by the clearing frenzy that swept Grimmauld Place in the remaining weeks before the new school year started.

If any one of the previous inhabitants of the house were to find their way back through the wards, they would not be able to reconcile the new appearance of the previously grim, dark residence. Gone were the dust-covered drapes and furniture. All the cobwebs and stalactite-like candles dripping down the chandeliers vanished in the face of Muggle cleaning products and house elf thoroughness. Every dark and oppressive object remaining in the wake of Mrs. Weasley's initial purge of the house were disarmed and in some cases relocated to saver and more secure locations within the manor. Each room received a new coat of paint, which took a solid week for the inhabitants to complete because the teenage witch insisted on painting every wall without the aid of magic. Refurbished furniture better fitting the space enhanced the new areas instead of stifling them. New drapes and rugs adorning freshly polished floors to added color to the new atmosphere of the house. Painting hung throughout the house brightening spaces instead of darkening them.

No longer were house elf heads hanging on the wall of the stairwell. No more troll-leg umbrella stands cluttered the entryway. No more _Toujours Pur_ decorating the front door. Even the tapestry displaying the Black family line did not survive Hermione's complete makeover of the Black Manor.

The only thing that stayed the same—with the exception of Sirius' room—was the enlarged picture of the original Order Hermione had gifted Sirius with at Christmas still hung in the previous home of Wulburga Black's portrait. Hermione recovered the duplicates from Harry's Christmas present and added a Muriel of happy memories to the item of remembrance.

Hermione dearly wished Harry could see the place now, but she knew that Dumbledore and the Weasleys (specifically Molly) would never let him out of their sight, especially now that the Death Eaters were openly targeting his friends.

As if thinking about his conjured him, Hermione felt the small compact mirror in her pocket heat up pulling her from her morose thoughts.

Fred must have finally given Harry her part of his birthday present, thought Hermione as she pulled the mirror out.

The idea came to her after Harry showed her the two-way mirrors the Marauders created to talk to each other during detentions and such.

Hermione however decided to make something less conspicuous then a hand-held mirror, especially in the hands of a teenage boy that was not considered vane by any stretch of the imagination. One look at Harry's hand-me-down clothes that he could easily have substituted with new ones during his summer school shopping sessions proved that he was less concerned about appearance, at least at the moment, than other teenage boys.

It might have something to do with his flailing confidence in his power to ensnare the opposite sex who was more interested in him as a person than the title the Wizarding world's savior and supposed "Chosen One".

She could not help but flush as she remembered the exuberant hug she received from Remus when she presented the idea of presenting a communication mirror to Harry while she kept the mated pair, providing them with a constant connection to the Boy-Who-Lived. Apparently, he had not thought of something so simple, but agreed wholeheartedly with the endeavor. He even helped her pick out the watch that Hermione decided to replace the one ruined during the second task of the Tri-Wizard Tournament.

The watch the werewolf chose was simple but classy. It actually came with a built in mirror, eliminating the task of magically incorporating one into the watch's design. With a simple push of a button, Harry could communicate with her. It reminded her of the spy movies that her father loved to watch late at night.

Seeing Harry's face appear in the glass in her hand, Hermione smiled.

Instead of adhering to common courtesy with the exchange of greetings, Harry plowed ahead saying, "Hermione, you have to get me out of here."

"What?" she asked, slightly confused.

"I need a break. She is driving me crazy."

"Who? Molly?"

"I wish. No, Ginny."

"What's wrong?"

"She won't stop following me around and touching me."

Hermione rolled her eyes. "She likes you, Harry."

Harry huffed. "I wish she would revert back to how she was before. She used to go out of her way to avoid me and the only sounds from her lips were squeaks," muttered Harry resentfully.

"Harry," said Hermione, trying to sound reprimanding but the hint of giggles in her voice gave her away.

"Come on, help me."

"Why should I risk the wrath of Ginny to help you? You are a capable wizard. You have fought the Dark Lord himself and survived yet you quake in the presence of a small, infatuated girl."

"I'll buy you something shiny if you rescue me from my stalker."

Tabling his request for a second, Hermione said, "Oh, that reminds me Harry. I found a locket while sorting through some stuff over here and wanted to do some further research on it. I need your verbal permission to take it out of Grimmauld because of the new wards."

"I will give you me permission if you help me escape."

Hermione pretended to think his bargain over. Making him sweat for a few more minutes, Hermione finally conceded. "Deal."

"I, Harry James Potter, give Hermione Jane Granger permission to remove a locket from Grimmauld Place."

"Thanks Harry."

The Boy-Who-Lived looked at his best friend expectantly. "Your turn."

"Put on your invisibility cloak and floo over."

Harry looked stunned. "It's that simple."

"Yes."

Shaking his head, he argued, "Can't be."

"It is. The wards here were essentially set up by you, so you can come and go as you please."

Harry looked momentary flabbergasted as he realized how much sooner his torment could have ended if he would have talked to Hermione days ago.

"I'll be right over then."

"Oh, and Harry, I hope you like what we have done with the place when you get here. Anything you want changed, we can change."

* * *

Harry loved the changes. He proved Hermione's theory that a previous occupant of the manor would not be able to recognize to the place correct.

Hermione took him on a tour of the new Grimmauld Place, letting him see everything that was new and different as well as the one place that was the same.

They never planned to turn Sirius' room into a type of shrine to the fallen Marauder, but that was kind of how it felt. It did not seem right to go and disturb that room without its master's approval. For now, the pain was still too close to the surface, the loss too recent for them to obliterate that one last remaining piece of his presence in the house. Photographs were not the same as a room that still held his smell. It seemed as if at any moment he would walk back into their lives and thus needed a space to still call his own.

For all these reason and more, the room had been unanimously voted to remain as-is until they all agreed that it was time to change it, to move on.

The one room Harry really seemed to fall in love with was surprisingly the ballroom. He could automatically see all of the potential that the room provided as a training room. The wide open space and hardwood floor were perfect for mock fights and practicing technique, while still providing room for the two of them to do their own separate things out of the way of each other.

Harry joked that in the week that she was in the Hospital Wing he felt like his muscles were atrophying. After a summer full of constant action, a week of leisure was really starting to get to the wizarding boy.

They planned right away to reassume training. They decided to wait to bring Ron into the fold, as it were, until they were back at Hogwarts, just in case a fight happened. They still did not want Molly or Dumbledore finding out about their summer activities. Something told Hermione that it would cause more trouble than solve if either found out.

Harry looked through the unoccupied bedrooms and picked one out to call his own. Remus went so far as to spell the boy's name on the door, declaring to everyone who stumbled across it that Harry Potter slept there. That nameplate seemed to really affect Harry. He rushed back over to the Burrow just so he could retrieve his trunk, bringing it back for the sole purpose of unpacking.

For the first time, Harry had a place to keep all of his things without fear of them being broken or purposely lost.

Everything that Harry had been carrying around that he gained from the Magical world that had been living in his school truck found itself on the floor of his new bedroom. Harry spent hours sorting through his belonging.

The first things placed in their new home were Harry's most prized possessions. The two photo albums he had with pictures of his family, one from Hagrid and the other from Hermione, as well as the pensieve from Sirius and memory vials were placed in the cabinet space at the bottom of him new bookshelf. He would get 'Mione or Moony to ward the doors later for added protection. His father's invisibility cloak was the first thing hung in his new wardrobe. His firebolt was lent against his new bedside table. Hedwig's cage was set underneath his new window, indicating that Harry would need another stand for the currently empty cage.

After those things were loving place in their new homes, Harry proceeded to fill up drawers of his new desk with old assignments and class notes. Shelves of his bookcase housed old textbooks from previous years as well as those he received as gifts for Christmas and birthdays. Old robes were hung in his new wardrobe beside his father's cloak.

While he knew some things should be thrown away or donated, Harry continued to fill his furniture with anything he did not need for the sheer novelty of having the furniture to clutter and junk up with useless shit. If he purposely left the odds and ends on the floor, no one called him on it.

Harry was in domestic heaven.

Grimmauld Place, after being occupied by various people for decades, finally began to feel like a real home.

* * *

The excitement of discovering the beauty of the manor underneath all of the oppressive darkness helped occupy Hermione's mind and distract her from her grief, but it did nothing to divert her mission.

Two days before she was due to return to Hogwarts, Hermione sat on the last step of the stairwell facing the basement door balled into the tightest position her body and the stair would let her.

She knew the transformation was bad, painful. She had witnessed it herself at fourteen outside the Whomping Willow's secret entrance.

But even then, she did not feel as helpless as she did in this moment, listening to the sweet man she had always admired losing himself to a beast far greater and stronger than any of the creatures he taught them about back in Third Year.

The torturous screams morphed into horrid howls and guttural growls and pitiful whimpering.

She desperately wanted to help him now.

Hermione's resolve reminded her of her arrangement with Sirius: for breaking him out of Grimmauld Place, he would aid her in becoming an animagus.

Before, the rationality behind performing that kind of magic was to give her an edge in future battles, battles that she knew would be plenty in the near future.

Now, she had another reason for seeking out the same knowledge. If she could change into an animal, Remus would not necessarily need to be locked up in a cage in the basement alone during the full moon.

Hermione cringed at each rattling hit against the metal bars caging him in, praying that he would grow tired of trying to escape soon and fall asleep like he was supposed to. The rattling however seemed to intensify the longer she sat there listening.

Unable to sit and simply listen to Remus hurt himself, Hermione got up and did the one thing she promised earlier that night when she locked the cage she would not do, she opened the basement door and carefully eased her way down the stairs.

The stairwell for the basement was dark, darker than any other place in the house. She knew from memory that there were no windows in the room. There had been a single candle lit when she was down there earlier, but it must have blown out at some point during Remus' transformation because it was clearly not still glowing.

Carefully, so that she would not fall, Hermione eased her way down the stairs and into the basement proper.

She could barely make out the cage in the dark. The only thing she could see clearly was two gleaming amber eyes watching her descent.

A chastising growl heralded her presence in the basement.

"I'm sorry," she said, as she slowly made her way over to the cage and sat down, "I couldn't stand it any longer."

The werewolf settled back on his hutches and huffed.

Despite his annoyance, her presence seemed to put the werewolf at ease for he finally decided to lie down on the pallet of blankets she had insisted on placing in the cage earlier that night and go to sleep.

Crookshanks seemed to materialize out of nowhere and curled up in Hermione's lap. "Have you been down here all night?"

The meowed answer was filled with somber helplessness.

"I know; I wish I could help him too."

Hermione continued to watch over the werewolf long into the night, offering silent company.

She reaffirmed to herself that, despite being consumed already with multiple projects, Hermione was going to begin steps towards becoming an animagus. Hopefully, in the near future, Remus would be able to once again run free during the full moon.

* * *

The normally warm and inviting Headmaster's Office in the prestigious magical school Hogwarts felt ominous and dark with only a single candle flame lighting the two figures perched around the cluttered desk. All of the portraits were frozen in their frames; some even had their mouths hanging open in mid speech.

The room was still and silent, as if the room itself was holding its breath.

Finally, the figure sitting behind the desk interrupted the silence. "I need you to keep a close eye on Miss Granger in addition to Harry this year Severus. I expect a detailed report of every spell she utilizes during any mock duels you schedule this year."

Scowling, Severus asked, "And may I inquire about this sudden interest in the chit?"

Dumbledore steepled his fingers and rested his chin on the point. "I need to assess if she is become dark and thus a danger to Harry."

The Potion Master scoffed at Dumbledore's reasoning. "Albus, you and I both know that that girl would rather cut off her wand hand then do anything that could put the Boy Wonder in any type of jeopardy."

"That may be, but given recent circumstances, I have to make sure that Harry is in good hands when the end comes."

"An end that lies in your hands," growled Severus.

Dumbledore gave an exasperated sigh, signaling that this was not the first time these two men had had this conversation.

"Regardless, I need require the information about Miss Granger and you are in the perfect position to observe it."

Severus could not believe this. Both of his Masters now had their sights set of one young witch because of how she defended herself during a home invasion against Death Eaters. Once again, that girl was putting him in a precarious position. "Would you prefer a list or the memory?"

Dumbledore seemed to ponder the question, weighing the merit of both. "Memory. I want to see how she handles herself and her opponent."

"Fine," said Severus, rising from his seat. "Don't forget to take those potions, Albus. Your life depends on them after all."

With that, Severus stormed out of the Headmaster's office, missing the look of devastation overtaking the once great and seemingly all powerful leader of the light.

* * *

_I could use some input from my readers:_

_I have some ideas about what form I want Hermione's animagus to be, but I was wonder what you guys though is the right animal to match our favorite bookworm's personality. _

_Also, who do you think Harry should be paired with? I was originally thinking Luna, but after watching HP7/2, I'm not so sure. I'm now thinking a Hufflepuff like Susan Bones._

_Let me know what you think in a __**review**__._


	11. Chapter 10

**AN:** Merry (belated) Christmas and Happy New Year! I wanted to get this out as a present but thought you guys would want a full chapter update instead of a rushed partial. (The partial would have only been 2000+ words.) Thank you so much for the reviews and input for the last chapter! Also, I hate the beginning of this by the way. Sorry if it sounds wrong.

* * *

_Dear Miss Hermione Granger,_

_I would like to begin by offering my deepest condolences on the loss of your parents. Your father was a dear friend, and your mother was a charming light that has left the world a little bit dimmer._

_I hope that this letter finds you in better health and spirits. I trust that the end of your summer long mystery will alleviate your mind enough that you can grieve and acclimate properly._

_The new pictures that you sent of the sides of the artifact illuminate the true meaning behind its function. This is a simple summarization— the whole translation is contained in the print-outs with the letter—but this archway appears to be some type of transportation device. The transition to a new location however does not seem to be the only thing the artifact can accomplish. The function is vague, and the translation does not make much sense. It seems like the archway leaves a traveler with no concrete destination in some kind of limbo-like holding area until either a location is decided upon or an alternative archway—one that has a function of arrival instead of departure—is procured._

_I am unsure of what all of this is pertaining to but hopefully it will help in your overall project._

_Feel free to contact me with any further questions or translation problems._

_Respectfully,_

_Dr. Winston Roper_

_Curator for the Department of Prehistory and Europe_

_British Museum, Great Russell Street, London, WC1B 3DG_

_Tel: +44 (0)20 7323 8100_

* * *

The last few days of summer break flew by due to its correlation with the full moon and impromptu Order meetings. In the rush of activity, Remus was unable to take Hermione to Diagon Alley to obtain her sixth-year school supplies. With Mrs. Weasley freezing the young witch out for her supposed slight to not only herself but Dumbledore, Hermione had virtually no access to the Wizarding shops. Harry volunteered to pick up the supplies that he knew she would need like parchment, quills, ink, books for the classes they would have together, but being stuck in Grimmauld for the last few days with her guardian absent for one reason or another and Mrs. Weasley watching Harry like a hawk, waiting for him to do something that she could report back to Dumbledore on left Hermione without anything for her NEWT Potions, Ancient Runes, and Arithmancy classes on top of money that she now owed Harry.

Checking her room one last time to insure she did not forget anything, the teenage witch left the space she had been occupying for the past three weeks for the last time until Christmas break. She knew it was uncharacteristic for her, but she was already looking forward to the holidays. She might not have spent a lot of time with him, but she already knew that she was going to miss Remus more than she had in previous years.

"Are you ready to go?"

The low gravelly voice broke Hermione out of her thoughts. Looking up, she took in Remus' casual wear, clothing that while old appeared less worn than anything he normally insisted on sporting.

"Yes," she replied, shutting her trunk with a satisfied click, "are we walking?"

"Only if you are up for it."

Hermione shrugged. "I don't expect a twenty minute walk will endanger my health any."

"That is not what I meant," mumbled the werewolf as he helped her down the stairs with her trunk.

"I wouldn't mind getting to stretch my legs for a bit. Being stuck here, even with impeccable company, has been kind of stifling."

"Walking it is then."

With the decision made, Remus flicked his wand to shrink her trunk so he could slip it into his pocket.

"Don't worry Remus," said Hermione, gently nudging him in the shoulder. "I can handle anything that comes at me."

"Even Molly?" asked Lupin with a teasing smile.

"Especially Mrs. Weasley. She has no power over me," said Hermione with an unconcerned shrug.

Remus grabbed the girl's shoulder before she could walk out the front door. "What is your problem with Molly?"

Hermione let out a heavy sound that was between a weary sign and an indignant huff. "I don't have a problem with her, per se... well, that is not necessarily true." Hermione turned to look her new guardian straight in the eye. "I don't appreciate the way she treats me or Harry."

Eyebrows lifted in surprise, Remus motioned for her to continue. "What do you mean?"

Hermione straightened her shoulders defensively, anticipating her words having a negative effect on her companion. "Well, with Harry, she acts like she owns him or something. And it goes way beyond simply wanting what is best for him or trying to give him a taste of a loving family. She is smothering, Remus, and she thinks she has the right to dictate how we both live. She has no right to block our admittance into the Order. Ron, I accept, because he is her child, but I'm not and neither is Harry. Also, she keeps shoving Ginny in his face even though he has repetitively let them both know that it's not going to happen. Ginny only wants the Boy-Who-Lived; she could care less about the boy who had a shit childhood or the one that still has problem accepting hugs."

"Ok, but what has she done to you?"

"Other than implying that I have to marry Ron?"

"When has she done that?"

"Have you not been paying attention the last year and a half?"

"What?"

Hermione simply shook her head. If he did not see what had been going on, there was no reason to bring it up now. Ron had already had this discussion with her, and they both agreed that they would never be anything more than friends.

"It doesn't matter. What matters is that acts like she is my mother." Hermione voice dropped into bitter distain, "She is _not_ my mother."

The werewolf internally winced at the young witch's tone. Cautiously, he began, "Hermione..."

Unfortunately, Hermione was gearing up for a rant, thus continued as if he had never made a sound. "I have a perfect mother, and even though she's not here anymore, that does not mean that she is any less present in my day-to-day life, helping me make decisions. So, if Mrs. Weasley wants to huff and bluster about how I am being ungrateful then she can go to hell."

"Hey," said Remus, concern and sadness mixing in his voice. "No one is trying to replace your mother."

"You could have fooled me with the way she has been acting for the last three years."

Choosing to ignore the bite in the teenager's angst ridden tirade, Lupin pulled the girl into a tight hug, lending all of the love and support he could give.

"And I don't need Dumbledore in anymore of my business than he already is," mumbled Hermione into the werewolf's chest.

Remus pulled away from her to see her face. "Back up."

Hermione extracted herself from Lupin's grasp and went over to pick up her trunk. "We need to leave, or we'll be late."

"Hermione..."

"Remus..." replied Hermione mockingly.

"Talk to me. I can't help if you don't say anything."

"It's just...I feel like I'm being boxed in," she said, shoulders slumping in defeat.

"How so?" Remus hated seeing the teenager look so disheartened. He missed the old Hermione; the one who always wore the brightest smile on the last Friday of August each year because she could not wait to get back to school; the one who did not look as if she had gone three rounds with a champion boxer and came out of it with two black eyes. Those dark spots under her dimmed whiskey irises made her look so lost and alone. Remus wasn't blind; he knew she hadn't been sleeping, Merlin, she didn't even eat much anymore. It was hard to tell with her baggy clothes, but he was sure she had dropped too much weight over the summer break. Some of that was due to her time in the Hospital Wing, but the rest came from her either forgetting to eat when she became so absorbed in the task she was attempting to accomplish that she forgot the time of day or that she simply didn't have an appetite anymore, which, the werewolf conceded, could actually be due to the potions Poppy was still making her take.

Remus could only hope that going back to Hogwarts and implementing a bit of regularity into her schedule would help bring back the Hermione that had been missing since June. Hopefully, she just needed to get away from some of her memories.

Hermione broke through his thoughts, finally composed enough to answer his question. "Everything's changed. My world has never been sunshine and rainbows, but things have been good, you know? I have friends that like me for me and not for what I can do for them. I have people who care about me; who notice when I go missing for hours and haven't eaten; who realize that I've had a bad day and just need a hug and some kind words. And then everything changed, everything became too real. I miss being able to pretend, to think that maybe, just maybe things will get better. But it's not going to get better. It's going to get worse, and people are going to keep dying. And...I don't know what to do anymore."

Hermione ran a shaky hand through her already disarrayed hair. "I had this big plan. I was going to spend the summer helping Harry. I was going to get him training and help him learn spells. I was going to give him tools that would keep him safe, keep him whole. I became so focused on Harry that I lost the big picture."

She looked up at Remus, and he could see that she was pleading with him, begging for understanding. That one look knocked the breath right out of his lungs.

"It's not your fault," he wheezed, forcing the words past the lump in his throat. "You did nothing wrong, do you understand?"

Hermione shook her head, shook off his words and reassurances. "I got too focused." Her words a mere whisper of the pain she was in, refusing to let it out, holding it tight and close and consuming.

Remus grabbed her shoulders and shook her slightly, not enough to hurt her but enough to get her attention. "I have said this once, and I will continue to say it until the words permeate your guilt. You could not have prevented any of this. I know you feel responsible for your parents, hell, you probably feel responsible for Sirius too, but nothing you could have done would have saved any of them."

Hermione struggled in his hold. "You don't know that. You can't know that."

He simply held her tighter, pulling her to him and into him. He wished he could shelter her from everything, take all of her pain and suffering away. "Hermione, you have got to let it go, let it out. Scream, curse, cry, do something that will give you an outlet. You have got to stop hurting yourself."

Remus could feel her shoulders shaking, knew that the walls she had been hiding behind were being to crack, but as he pulled her back to look into her eyes, he knew that she wasn't ready to break, and he wasn't the one she was going to let see behind those walls, not yet.

The werewolf forced himself to look to her eyes and see all of her pain. He needed her to hear what he was about to say. "I want you to stop putting the world on your shoulders. Hermione, you have got to give yourself some time to grieve. Don't spend this semester stuck behind a book. Spend your time with your friends, having fun and being young. I need you to do this for me, okay?"

Remus looked long and hard into the young witch's eyes.

She took a deep breath and slowly let it out, centering herself. "I'll try, but I make no promises."

Lupin slumped a little at her words, but all he could hope for was that she _would_ try.

"Okay. Let's get going," said the werewolf, picking up the cat carrying cage. "We don't want you to be late for the train."

The two headed out the door, lost in their own thoughts, pondering the trials to come.

* * *

The walk to King's Cross was silent and uneventful. The platform of 9 ¾ however was full to brim with noise and commotion. The families of returning students loitered to watch their progenies depart once again to a magical boarding school. Animals squawked and rumbled in their cages, awaiting their turn to board the train with their masters. Children ran around enthusiastically greeting friends that they had not seen since the end of last term.

Looking at the families clustered around her, Hermione felt the air leave her lungs. The cracks Remus uncovered earlier fractured a little bit more with a visual reminder that her parents should have been with her today, pestering her about writing as often as her studies would allow and completing this year without any life threatening incidences.

But they weren't here.

And that reminder made her want to crawl into a deep, dark hole and hide from the rest of the world.

But she couldn't.

Not now.

Not when the monster that ordered her parents' deaths was still out there destroying other families and other people's happiness.

Before, her battle with the darkness permeating the Wizarding world revolved around protecting Harry and making sure he survived to graduate from school and have a future with a family of his own.

Now, it was personal.

Now, she was out for blood.

She would not stop until those responsible were removed from the general population one way or another, in prison or in a pine box.

Stumbling into Remus when she was bumped from behind shook her out of her dark thoughts.

Feeling strong hands steady her, Hermione looking into crystal blue eyes that she had come to trust and rely on since her world fell apart. The young witch launched herself into his protective arms, surrounding herself in his warmth and care one last time before boarding the train.

By burying herself in the werewolf, Hermione missed the curious looks and stares her presence was beginning to stir, but Remus did not miss them. He could only hope that people would give her enough space to make it onto the train and into a compartment before inundating her with questions and suspicions. The young girl in his arms did not need any additional stress to be added to her already overflowing pile.

Pulling away from her, Remus gave Hermione a heartwarming smile and wished her luck in the upcoming year with the promise of writing to her like he did last year every chance he could get. He was not surprised in the slightest to realize just how much he was going to miss the teenager in the upcoming months before Christmas. For the first time in while, with the only exception being last year, Remus was actually looking forward to the winter holidays. He would finally have family that he could call his own to spend it with again.

With one last squeeze, Remus sent Hermione on her way, content to wait and watch the train pull away like all of the other proud parents on the platform.

Hurrying down the corridor, Hermione peaked through windows, looking for the familiar face of one of her friends. She chose to ignore all of the staring directed her way as she continued down the train. She was not sure if the attention was from her jaunt in the Department of Mysteries back in June with the now publically proclaimed "Chosen One" by the _Daily Prophet_ or if it was because of her second brush with the rising darkness last month. Due to her long stay in the Hospital Wing and everyone's tight lips, Hermione had no idea what the public opinion of her survival against a Death Eater attack was. Of course, in the back of her mind, the teenager could not help but wonder if Dumbledore bothered to bring the matter before the magical authorities or have Kingsley stifle the news in some way. After all, she was the best friend of the Boy-Who-Lived and an attack on her might cause more fear (fear that the general public should feel) than he believed was necessary at the time. Plus, the attack might raise more questions than Hermione herself was willing to answer like how she managed to hold her own against eight fully trained wizards and live to tell the tale.

She still did not even know who the Death Eaters were that had been sent to kill her and failed.

Continuing her journey down the train, Hermione was not surprised when she found Luna and Neville sitting in a compartment near the back without a Weasley or Harry in sight.

After all of these years and five children out of school, one would think Mrs. Weasley would finally have her timing right and make it to the train before it was about to take off.

Both of the occupants of the compartment turned when they heard the door open.

Neville jumped to his feet when he realized who was gaining entrance.

"Hermione!" exclaimed Neville. "Where is your trunk?"

Hermione looked at Neville in confusion for a second, processing what he had asked. When she did, she gave him a small smile. "In my pocket."

"How?"

"Remus."

"Professor Lupin?"

"Yes."

"Why would he..."

"Neville," called the dreamy voice in the corner. "Shouldn't you let Hermione sit before you start interrogating her?"

"I'm not interrogating her," replied the confused youth.

"Yes, you are," countered Luna.

Neville looked back at Hermione with a sheepish smile on his still slightly cubby face. "Sorry about that."

"No problem Neville," said Hermione as she let Crookshanks out of his cage and took a sit across from the two people who she had in the last year began to think of as friends. "And to answer your question, Remus is my guardian since my parents..."

"Your parents?"

The confusion on both of the blondes' faces put to rest the quandary Hermione pondered earlier about Dumbledore keeping everything under wraps. Figures.

Well, it did until Neville elaborated at least.

"But, he's a werewolf."

"So?"

"Hermione, the Wizengamot would not have let him be your guardian, especially after being orphaned by a Death Eater attack."

Damn, thought Hermione, so Dumbledore did alert the press. She really needed to get her hands on a _Prophet_ to see what the public knew. It's not that cared what people thought about her, but she wanted to know how much of the night's events were publicized. Maybe the names were in the paper. She really did want to know the identities of those men. Not for revenge. She had a sneaking suspicion that they may no longer be among the living after failing so spectacularly, but she just needed to know. If she was ever to find any closure or comfort in the aftermath of that night, she needed to know the names.

"He is my legal guardian not my magical one," answered Hermione, getting back to the topic at hand. "It's all a long story, which I really don't want to go into right now, so...look Harry's here."

Ignoring the contrite look that crossed Neville's face after Luna's elbow met his ribcage, Hermione jumped up from her seat to help her two best friends get situated in the compartment then dragged them to sit on either side of her, providing her with the feeling of security she left with Remus on the platform.

Harry adjusted himself into a comfortable position against the window before pulling Hermione closer into his side, casually draping his arm across her shoulder before turning to greet his two friends sitting on the other side of the compartment.

Ron turned to Hermione. "So, I hear you have some things to tell me once we get back to school."

Hermione looked at him in confusion for a moment before turning and elbowing Harry in the side.

"Oomph, what was that for," wheeze Harry.

"I thought we were going to wait to tell him together," replied Hermione, crossing her arms across her chest.

Harry removed his arm from the back of the seat to rub his ribs. Hermione might be a small, but she was also bony and knew how to use that to her advantage. "I didn't tell him everything."

"Well, you're going to have to now," cut in Ron, "because you have me curious about what you two have been hiding from me."

Hermione signed, rubbing her eyes tiredly. "It's not much. I just helped Harry a little over the summer. We'll talk about it later."

Ron felt his irritation grow slightly, but after pulling in a deep breath, he decided that he could wait a couple more hours to find out exactly what Harry had been up to while at his relative's house. Harry had only told Ron about Hermione's redecoration of Grimmauld Place so far, but from the way it sounded, his two best mates had been keeping secrets from him. He just hoped it wasn't of a romantic nature. If it was, he wasn't sure he would be able to keep from lashing out and yelling at Hermione after everything she had been through recently would just be bad for him in the end while causing distance between him and his best friends.

Crossing his arms, Ron turned towards the door, watching his sister walk in.

Harry seeing that the conversation was over for now returned to talking to Luna, leaning forward to take in her whispery tones about her summer adventure, searching for the _Crumple-Horned Snorkack._

"Ginny, are you staying?"

Ron watched as his sister turned towards Harry, taking in his focus on Luna with narrowed eyes. The elder Weasley almost rolled his. His sister had to get past this infatuation with his best mate. The girl barely said two words to Harry before last year, and even during the DA meetings, she wasn't exactly personable towards him. He hated it for his sister, but she was not even on Harry's radar and likely never would be.

"I can't stay. I have to go meet Dean," said Ginny with an expectant look towards Harry. When the boy did not turn his attention away from Luna, she grabbed bag and stomped out the compartment, slamming the door behind her.

Harry looked away from Luna and towards the door with confusion. He turned his gaze to Hermione for an explanation, only to see her already absorbed in a book, ignoring the world around her.

Observing his best friend, Harry felt the same helplessness that had been consuming him for the last month. While he was drowning in his grief over Sirius' death, Hermione had stood beside him and created a routine that would not only keep his mind busy, preventing him from plummeting into a depression, but she also helped improve his combat skills and spell casting, giving him a better chance at surviving in the upcoming war. But now, in her greatest time of need, Harry did not know how to help her. Both he and Remus had tried over and over again to get her to talk about what happened that night, but she refused to speak about it. Every time they broached the subject, she would change the topic and discuss the continuing of Harry's training once they went back to Hogwarts. She even redecorated Grimmauld in her mission to not think about what happened to her.

Harry knew that her answer to trauma was not right or healthy, but he did not know how to fix it.

He wasn't Hermione.

Looking down at the girl leaning against his shoulder, Harry could only hope that being back at Hogwarts would finally help her come to terms with what happened.

Noticing that Hermione's attention had finally shifted from the book in her hands to the blonde across from them, Harry turned his attention back to Luna.

"Luna, I found a spell over the summer and was wondering if you would let me place it on your trunk."

The blonde emerged from behind her upside-down _Quibbler_ with a quizzical frown upon her face.

"What does it do?" she asked in childlike curiosity.

"Not much," said Hermione with an unconcerned shrug, "just returns all of a person's items back into the trunk at the end of the day. Harry mentioned how your stuff goes missing."

Harry could not suppress the wide smile that crossed his face. Here he was wondering how he could help her and Hermione was puzzling out ways she could help someone else.

He knew what this was.

This was another distracting technique to get her mind off of her own problems, but he also knew that Luna did not have anyone that looked out for her. Her own housemates were the ones who were bullying her.

Harry wished that he could somehow get the harassment to stop, but he had a feeling he would do more damage than good.

"Hermione," began Luna, "the Nargles always return what they take. I don't want them hurt."

Harry would hear the deep breath Hermione took before answering the blonde and he was proud of her. She was putting her disbelief away so that she could perform something helpful.

"What I want to do won't hurt anyone," she replied, "even if I think they deserve it."

The last part of the sentence was so low that Harry, sitting beside her, almost did not hear what Hermione said. He had to agree though. The people stealing Luna's stuff deserved at least a nasty shock for removing and then hiding her belongings.

"The spell will just make sure that all of your belongings will be back in your trunk each night," continued Hermione.

Harry turned to watch Luna process what Hermione was offering her. He could not decipher her thoughts. Her face simply radiated her normal dreamy and calm expression.

"Luna, friends look out for each other. Let me help."

Harry could tell a difference in the blonde now. With the slip of one word, Luna's countenance shifted from slightly aloof to completely focused on the brunette sitting next to him. The realization of what would sway Luna's decision caused a pain in his own chest.

"Friends?" whispered Luna. "Yes, the spell would be nice. Thank you, Hermione."

The brunette simply nodded her head and helped Luna remove her trunk from the overhead rack.

The spell didn't take long, just a few words and three runes carved into the inside of the top of Luna's trunk, but Harry could tell a profound difference in Luna herself. She seemed happier and more relaxed with the group of people surrounding her.

While Hermione's mission was to help him, Harry decided that he would make it his mission to help Luna and make sure that she knew she had people would cared about her and saw passed her 'Loony' persona.

"Hermione," Ron interrupted. "We need to head out. Prefect meeting."

Hermione looked at the redhead and nodded her consent, promising the others that they would be back.

With Ron and Hermione gone, the three remaining members of the compartment fell into an easy flow of conversation, discussing anything that fit their fancy, even Luna's invisible creatures. Nothing was off limits. If only they could have locked the door to prevent the outside world from interrupting them.

* * *

Before beginning his education, he had set values and understandings. He was a Pureblood and embraced everything that that entailed: power, prestige, wealth, envy of his peers, disgust of those deemed lower than himself, and a high sense of position within the Wizarding world.

These were all fermented in his mind at a young age.

He was grown, bred to believe every single piece of Pureblood propaganda that his father spoon-fed him.

Entering Hogwarts changed that.

He began to question his father's teachings.

The questioning began with his infamous failed alliance with the Boy-Who-Lived-to-Later-Annoy-Him-to-Death. How could the savior of the Wizarding world refuse an association with one of the most powerful and influential Pureblood families for a band of poor and ill-bred blood traitors?

As the Prefect meeting began, Draco slumped in his seat looking at the curly-haired brunette across from him who solidified his questing curiosity about Pureblood teachings. She was the one person who contradicted everything he had ever been taught. Granger should not be as brilliant as she was, should not be as proficient in spell-casting and potion-making. If the lessons were to be believed, the Gryffindor Princess would have to be at least a half-blood, which would account for her multiple talents and aptitudes.

But she wasn't.

He should know. After he learned that she completed her first year at Hogwarts with record-breaking scores that even rivaled those of the Dark Lord, he had her secretly investigated. Of course, he couldn't go through the elite channels to suss out her history. He had to pull in the reserves for this mission into enemy territory.

He hired his mate, Blaise Zabini.

Draco knew that in this one maneuver he was putting his self in a tricky spot.

If his father caught wind of his interest in a Mudblood, he would be guaranteed a few rounds of pain incurred by a certain snake cane.

Well, maybe not.

It would depend really upon how the information got to his father and the condition the story was in. He had no doubt that he would make the cane's acquaintance if his father learned of a tawdry love affair with filth.

So his father could never find out his son's newest curiosity.

Fortunately, Blaise was curious about the Gryffindor anomaly himself and had already instigated an initially investigation of one Hermione Granger.

The results were unfortunate.

Turns out she really was a Mudblood.

Because of that one fact, Draco knew that he should hate her.

She was filth.

She was beneath him.

She was fascinating.

He enjoyed antagonizing her just to see what her retort would be.

He had learned third-year that, although she had been in the Wizarding world for over two years, the girl still relied on Muggle physical tactics when she was pushed past her breaking point.

She was also unyieldingly loyal to those she put her trust in.

Draco could not really understand how the Weasel and Scar-head had managed to earn her loyalty; they seemed at large to not return the sentiment.

Draco hated them.

He would give anything to have someone watching his back the way Granger watched those two ungrateful sods'. Instead, he had inept, blundering fool trotting in his wake.

He also knew she had a wicked temper and was unafraid to get her hands dirty if she felt it was necessary. One only had to remember Umbridge or look at Edgecomb's face for proof.

For someone who has the appearance of a rule-abiding, brown-nosing, authority-pleasing suck-up, Hermione Granger's moral compass points slightly off North whenever she feels following protocol with negatively affect or prevent the outcome she wishes to happen.

Basically he had been spying on Granger for years, so his assignment from the Dark Lord should not affect him too much, right? Granger-Watch had long ago become a past time he excelled at.

But for some unknown reason, the idea of reporting back to the Dark Lord about who Granger associates with and what she was studying left a foul taste in his mouth.

The Dark Lord should not care about these things.

Granger was supposed to be nothing more than an obstacle to be destroyed.

She was the Boy-Who-Lived's best friend thus a way to rattle him with her death.

That was the original plan after all.

Now, she had become somewhat of a fascination. The Dark Lord was beginning to recognize the things that Draco and Blaise picked up on first-year.

Draco did not like that.

It was like someone eyeing his favorite toy, and he could see in the culprit's eyes that he was going to devise a plan to steal it right out from under him if he ever took his eyes away from it.

This whole mess was beginning to eat at the young Pureblood. He knew that he had no real choice about performing his duty to the Dark Lord—his father's failure and imprisonment had insured that, but Draco also knew that Granger was the brains behind the Trio. To provide the Dark Lord with an in-depth report about her—a repost that he could already give—would be to clue him into one of the secrets fueling the opposition.

Adding all of this to the questions he already had, Draco was stuck between two unyielding walls.

He needed someone to talk to, someone who would not turn his insecurities against him when an opportunity arose.

For now though, he was going to sit back and do as he was told. Maybe something he sees will lead him to the answers he seeks.

* * *

The rest of the train ride was uneventful and short. Students continued to stare at the five of them as they past their windows or met them when they ventured out of the compartment. Harry even had an insulting conversation with a fourth-year Romilda Vane about his choice in friends before suffering through a meeting with Professor Slughorn while Ron and Hermione sat through another tedious Prefect meeting.

Harry had to admit that he was happy that Hermione decided to continue with being a Prefect. He could not help but think that Ron patrolling with anyone else would work. Hermione, though possessing a temper herself, was one of the few people that could stop Ron from losing his cool at others and doing something that could get him expelled.

Well, except for with Malfoy.

That git just didn't know when to shut his stupid gob and mind his own business.

After quickly changing into school robes, Harry made his way off of the Hogwarts Express with his friends, heading towards the carriages.

As they began to climb into one, Harry turned, realizing one of his friends was no longer next to him. He looked around and closed his eyes when he spotted her.

Before him, frozen in place, was Hermione, staring at the Thestral harnessed to the last carriages closet to the train.

He watched as his friend slowly inched toward the skeletal black, winged horse and hesitantly raised her hand. Slowly, as if afraid the creature would disappear, Hermione ran her hand lightly down its long nose with the tips of her fingers.

Harry wished his could see her face, but unfortunately she was turned away from him.

Maybe, the newly proclaimed "Chosen One" hoped, she would now be able to move forward.

After all, the Thestral was a visual reminder of what she went though, of what she witnessed. She could not ignore it or shove it to the side.

It was right there in front of her, looking her in the eye.

Harry could tell by the drastic rise and fall of her shoulders, Hermione was beginning to hyperventilate. It was as if he could actually _see_ his best friend's shields breaking before his very eyes.

Her voice carried on the wind over to him. Her pain and desperation were palpable even from a distance.

"No. No, no, no, no. Please. No, no, no, no, no, no."

The first sound of her gasping sobs mixed with her begging broke Harry from his trance. He quickly moved towards Hermione, pulling her towards him and into his embrace as the sobs broke into heart-wrenching screams.

Seeing Ron coming towards them, Harry waved his friend on with the hope that one of them would think to tell McGonagall why they did not arrive to the castle with everybody else.

He could feel Hermione tighten her hands into the sides of his robe, anchoring herself as she let her grief drown her.

Her knees eventual gave out, pulling Harry down with her until they were both kneeling on the ground. Hermione's head became buried in his neck; her tears drenching his shoulder.

Seeing her in so much pain and anguish, Harry felt his own tears begin to fall as they slid down his face to join with hers, mixing them together in a morose bond.

Lost in their misery, they did not see the bubblegum-haired Auror walk up to them, but Harry did catch the shimmering glow of a Patronus zipping past their huddled forms. He made no move to greet the person before them. He continued to focus all of his attention to the broken girl in his arms, seeking his comfort and strength. He knew they were missing the sorting and opening speech. He knew that they were going to get into trouble for their absence, but he really could not summon the will to care.

Right there, kneeling on the ground beside the Hogwarts Express, Harry held his friend, promising silently to her and himself that he would never let anything happen to her again that would make her react like this.

He was going to do everything in his power to survive this war.

He would not let all of Hermione's hard work go in vein.

Feeling her body begin to calm and her breathing even out, Harry surmised that Hermione had cried herself to sleep. He looked down to confirm his suspicions and saw the tear tracks still clinging to her angelic face.

Awkwardly heaving her into his arms, Harry finally turned and acknowledges the person beside him. "We need to get her to the castle and up to bed."

"Come on," said Tonks, clearing her throat and wiping away her own tears from his slightly reddened face. "You head straight to the Tower while I get the password from Minerva. I'll be just a few steps behind you."

With that, Harry began the long trek towards the castle with his precious burden, making plans to stop by the kitchens after getting Hermione situated. Emotional stress always made him hungry.

* * *

The darkness surrounded her again like it did last night and the night before that and the night...well, like every night since the beginning of summer. She was really getting sick of standing in forever darkness with nothing but the wails and cries of disembodied voices as company.

"Witchling."

Of course, the bodiless wonders surrounding her at least left her alone while she took a break from the bloody remains of her parents screaming recriminations each night.

If only tonight was like the majority of her dreams.

Sighing, Hermione addressed the voice situated somewhere behind her. "How can I help you tonight? Got any vague riddles you would like to impart to me?"

"Time is short," replied the voice, causing Hermione to roll her eyes at the cliché. "You need to find the place with all the answers to complete your quest of righting a wrong against Destiny."

Hermione turned around and stared darkly into the pervasive shadows. "I have already been through the library at Hogwarts. I scoured the public and restricted sections as soon as I could escape the Hospital Wing."

"No, you need the room that is without restrictions or monitoring," answered the voice.

"Could be more specific," implored the young witch.

"Find the room and you will find your answers."

"I need more information," snapped Hermione. "Hey! I need more information!"

Silence consumed the darkness.

* * *

**Review?**

So, Draco has finally began his way towards redemption, which you guys voted on.

Not completely happy with the chapter, but I felt the emotions need to be finally let out after so much time bottled up.

Short question: Is there any character that you **want** to see meet his/her demise? Since "Operation," I have had a list of people you guys want to live through the war, but is there anyone that you have decided needs to be a casualty of the Second Wizarding War?


	12. Chapter 11

_AN: Thanks to all of you for being patient for this update and for your reviews on the last chapter. Sorry for the long wait. Hopefully it was worth it._

* * *

Due to her desire to escape the stares and whispers of her fellow students following her emotional undulation, Hermione left the sixth-year dorms before any of the Gryffindors awoke to make her way to Professor McGonagall's office for her schedule before journeying to the library to while away her hours until her first class began.

She was not going to suffer through anymore of her peers' gawking then absolutely necessary, especially since she was still not a hundred percent sure what the emotions were behind the other students' attentions.

Of course, things never seem to go as she plans anymore.

The deserted hallway leading to McGonagall's office gave Hermione hope that she would make it to her destination without any unnecessary interruption.

The heavy footsteps behind her shattered her fragile peace.

"Miss Granger," rang a smooth drawl from over her left should.

Hermione dropped her head, silently cursing the gods as she took a deep breath to re-center herself.

"Five points from Gryffindor for wandering the halls."

The young witch barely suppressed rolling her eyes at the dark man's usual response to meeting her in the hallway. It did not really matter if she was wandering the halls or heading to Dumbledore's office on his orders. Five points were always coming from Gryffindor if he encountered her alone in the halls before classes began.

Maybe she should disillusion herself every time she stepped out of the dorms before breakfast began to prevent these morning meetings.

Nah.

Why deprive the man of his little, twisted joys. It's not like she doesn't win them back within the first class she has within the hour of the point deduction.

This morning, Hermione did decide clarification was in order though to prevent the man from taking any other unnecessary points away for loitering or not being in the Great Hall for breakfast despite the fact that the meal still had over an hour before it would be served for the early risers.

"I'm not wandering, Professor Snape. I am heading to Professor McGonagall's office."

"And what could be so pressing that it could not wait until after breakfast?" inquired Snape with a slight sneer.

"I wanted to get my schedule, so I could start on my coursework," replied Hermione, her tone lacking all of the annoyance she internally felt.

"Miss Granger, I know for a fact that you have already read all of this year's material at the beginning of the summer by barrowing one of the Weasley twin's sixth-year books. Now, I ask again, what are you doing out of your house this early?"

Hermione huffed as she crossed her arms. "I really am going to see Professor McGonagall for my schedule as you can tell from the direction I am heading as only her office is down this particular stretch of hallway. What I happen to be doing after that is really my own business, but since you asked _oh so nicely_, I'll tell you. After receiving my schedule and probably a lecture, I am then heading to the library," she replied with heavy cynicism before sighing. "I apologize for my tone. It was uncalled for and unnecessary. I was raised better. When's the detention going to be?"

Snape's silence lingered as Hermione's tension began to increase as she awaited her sentencing. One does not get away with disrespecting a professor, especially not Professor Severus Snape, Potions Master and Head of Slytherin House.

And yet, he let her that morning.

"I think twenty points from Gryffindor for backtalk will suffice since the school year has not officially started yet."

The teenager looked up at the dower man before her in astonishment.

"But," started Snape as he took a step forward to loom over the petite witch before him, "if you do it again, it will be a week's detention scrubbing first-years' cauldrons without the aid of magic, am I clear?"

"Yes, sir," replied Hermione, looking guiltily at the floor after being properly chastised.

"Wonderful," sneered the professor before he whorled around back the way he came with his robes billowing behind him.

The girl shook her head as she watched him leave. One had to give it to the man; he knew how to make a stylish exit while still maintaining an air of malice and danger.

Hermione returned to her prior task and headed once again in the direction of Professor McGonagall's office. She had something important she needed to start working on and Snape gave her the inspiration she had been lacking until that very moment.

* * *

Hermione sighed as she stood in front of the painting of Barnabas theBarmy glad that she was finally able to make it up to the entrance of the Room of Requirement. The universe had seemed to work against her this morning with first running into Professor Snape and his snarky attitude far too early in the day and then Professor McGonagall felt it was her duty to act as her personal guidance councilor after her minor breakdown yesterday by the carriages. Luckily, a few promises to come to her if she needed to chat and that she would actually eat one meal today in the Great Hall got her out of her professor's office.

Clearing her mind of anything but what she needed, Hermione gripped the handles of her backpack as she paced before the wall three times asking for a private place that only she had access to. On the third pass, a door emerged in the once solid wall.

The door itself was nothing special, just a simple fashioned plank of oak adorned with a plain brash handle; the place that held all of the appeal was the sanctuary promised behind the wood, begging for Hermione to enter and claim the space as her own.

Deciding not to deny the room its fondest request, Hermione entered expecting to find a cozy space with a work table and maybe some board-lined walls. Maybe even a training area in the back portion of the room that had flittered through her head as she made the second pass before the wall.

Instead, Hermione found a room covered from floor to ceiling with piles and piles of junk.

"What?"

Shaking her head, Hermione backed out of the room, closing the door. The door, she noticed, was now different. Where the oak she desired blended nicely into the light stone wall for added protection against passersby, the door before her was an old, heavy metal. It looked like something that belonged within a Gothic cathedral rather than to a room filled with roads of broken and discarded things.

"Strange," she commented before once again passing back and forth in front of the bare stretch of wall after the door dissolved into the magic of the castle.

Perhaps she was not as specific about her needs the last time.

On the third pass, the oak door once again emerged from the wall.

Hermione opened the door and again found herself in the room full of unwanted things. Confused, Hermione set her bag against the wall to try her luck a third time to create the room she needed so she could begin again with her translations and studies.

On the third pass, her door again appeared, but she decided to take a peak before retrieving her bag, hoping for a different outcome from the two previous forays into the magical room.

Hermione cracked the door open to see finally the room she desired before her. A nice cozy couch rested in front of a small fire. The bookcases contained titles needed for the translation of lost or long dead languages. She could see the board she required hanging on the back wall from ceiling to floor, waiting for her to tack her notes and pictures upon it. There was even an open area to the left side where she could practice spells and move through the workout regiment she started over the summer that she had been neglecting for the past few weeks. Satisfied with the arrangement, she slowly inched her way into the room to make sure that the room would remain the study area she longed for.

It did.

Relieved, Hermione lend out of the room and grabbed her bag.

As soon as her bag crossed the doorway, the room began to swirl and sway. The walls creaked, breaking from their locked position between the ceiling and the floor to run further away from where they were before. The ceiling ripped from its supports and arched into a large cathedral-like doom. The floor dissolved the soft carpet she had longed to dig her toes in until reaching the harsh tiles hidden underneath.

Hermione closed her eyes as a wave of nausea swept through her from all of the sudden changes surrounding her.

A deafening roar had the young witch risking her stomach's contents to look at the newly structured ceiling to witness an unleashing of torrents of furniture, glass, wizarding toys, books, and many, many other things falling at an alarming rate towards her stationary form.

Screaming, Hermione dove back out of the doorway, barely escaping a cracked grandfather clock hurtling into the place she was previously standing.

Once the last item bounced into its proper position among the ordered chaos, the young witch let out a frustrated shriek. "What?" she asked the room. "What is with this room?"

She was again standing out in the hallway looking at the room of seemingly forgotten and unwanted objects.

Hermione frowned as she took in the mountains of stuff around her for the third time, trying to figure out where she was going wrong. She knew that her request was not what was causing the room's noncompliance, for she had stood in the room she requested before grabbing her bag and pulling it through the doorway.

The young witch looked down at the object in her hand and tilted her head.

She once again sat her bag down on the ground and paced three times in front of the blank wall, requesting a bathroom this time to test her hypothesis.

A different door appeared this time, a blue one with a glass knob, and as she opened it, she discovered once again what she had requested. Behind the door was a simple bathroom; nothing special, just something for a single person to run into in the case of an emergency.

Hermione turned to look at her bag before hesitatingly picking it up and carrying it to the doorway. She took a step into the room with her bag still dangling outside in the hallway from her hand.

The room was still a bathroom.

Slowly, Hermione pulled her bag into the room with her. The room instantly changed once more to the forgotten land of school junk.

At least standing in the doorway prevents a near miss with a homicidal timepiece, she grumbled internally.

She dropped the offending bag onto the ground beside her with a huff as she waited for the dizziness to leave her once again. Once her equilibrium returned, she lowered herself to sit next to her bag. Clearly it contained something that was messing with the room. Something she normally did not carry with her. Something new. Something from Grimmauld Place that contained even more mystery now that it held power over the Room of Requirement than it did before when it was an interesting heirloom from a pureblood family with a possible connection to the founders of the very school she currently stood in.

Something that seemed to have a mind of its own, she thought; for as she liberated the strange necklace from her bag, it levitated, stretching as if in search of something within the massive room.

Deciding to play along, Hermione began walking in the direction the necklace pointed as if it was some sort of compass.

When the necklace turned, she turned.

The young witch walked past mountains of broken furniture: desks, chairs, stools, pieces of bookcases, and shelves. Some of the pieces looked spell damaged and burnt, while others, she could tell, were still perfectly intact. She concluded that those were probably dumped here when replaced with newer and better equipment. She noticed congealed potions, chipped vials, hats, jewels, cloaks, piles of swords—both rusty with blood or from ill-use and shiny from no use at all; she saw corked bottles with bubbling contents perched precariously atop one of the many mountains of books.

The books made Hermione dig in her heels as the necklace continued to pull her along through the rows and rows of miscellaneous stuff long forgotten by time and faculty. A casual sweep through some of the titles revealed long since banned texts mixed among out of print copies of hard to find tomes. She could see manuscripts littered sparingly between stacks of ripped and damaged hardbacks. She made a mental note to scour the room for anything that could be of use after she reached the end of her impromptu journey.

Taking a sharp left, the teenage spotted what looked like dragon eggshells tossed uncaringly on a grouping of Fanged Frisbees and winged catapults, which she assumed were collected and dropped here by the castle house-elves.

Hermione noticed the Vanishing Cabinet that Montague stupidly got lost in when his mate dared him inside the broken transportation device. Anyone with a lick of sense would know that one needs the other cabinet before taking a jaunt through...

The witch's thoughts came to an abrupt standstill.

The Vanishing Cabinet was a transportation device, albeit a broken one—or at least a disconnected one—but a transportation device all the same.

The locket gave a sharp pull, alerting Hermione to the fact that she had stopped in front of the abandoned piece of enchanted furniture. She ran her fingertips across the cabinet's side, feeling the residual magic still clinging to the wood. With just a glance, she could already make out some of the runes engraved in the seams of the door and around the top and bottom of the cabinet.

Yes, this will come in handy, thought Hermione as she continued to follow the jewelry hanging from her fingers.

Taking a right, the witch encountered a cupboard with its door slowly disintegrating into sawdust from what appeared to be a type of acid, probably a potion gone horribly wrong. She could make out the contents of the cupboard without having to touch the door, which was a cage with its long dead and decayed occupant resting at the bottom of the enclosed metal in the form of bones.

Someone's dead pet, she mused. Probably hidden by a careless roommate from the pet's owner in the hopes of escaping blame and punishment.

The locket gave a slight jerk upward, directing Hermione's attention to a chipped bust of an old, unfortunate-looking warlock with a tarnished diadem atop the crown of his head. The necklace gave another impatient pull towards the bust before dropping lifelessly across her fingers.

"Ok," said the young girl. "Let's see what all the fuss is about."

Dropping the now docile locket into her pocket, Hermione pulled out her wand and began casting detection spells around the area and specifically on the bust itself for anything that could explain the locket's odd behavior.

Out of everything resting on the top of the cupboard, the diadem was the only thing relaying any type of magical signature. She could detect a strange compulsion charm intertwined into the metal of the tarnished tiara that reacted to skin contact. The thing also seemed to have some magic suppressants incasing it, probably to prevent summoning charms.

Pausing in her examination, Hermione extracted the locket back out of her pocket and placed it on the ground before performing the same detection spells on it.

Just as she thought, the magic incasing both items contains the same identifiable magical signature, but the locket's defensive spells seemed to be triggered by prolonged wear without the aid of compulsions.

Thank you, Remus, mentally crowed the young witch. Your birthday present from last year had not been in vain. And they criticized you for giving a tome on master-level charms. Ha!

Scouring the room for a container of some kind, Hermione spotted a tattered blanket crumpled between a corroded cauldron and what at one time might have been the top portion of a desk but now looked like a half transfigured bird-shaped thing. She carefully eased the fabric out of its resting place and spread it out on the ground in front of her. Repairing the minor rips and tears easily after spelling it clean, the blanket was given one last enchantment—a strengthening charm—before Hermione turned her attention back to the dilemma of removing the diadem from its long maintained home amongst the rubbish.

The spells surrounding it prevented summoning, but the bust which it rests upon had no such limitations, thought Hermione.

Deciding to chance it, she attempted to _accio_ the ugly warlock to her.

It did not even flinch.

Maybe levitation?

Trying again, Hermione cast her spell.

Nothing.

She tapped her wand against her thigh as she once again surveyed the cupboard. She could see nothing of value or danger situated on top of or within the piece of furniture.

She picked up her blanket and tossed it to the side then picked the locket back up off the floor.

Stepping behind the cupboard, Hermione gave the already damaged item a forceful shove and watched at its contents embraced gravity to tumble to the floor.

Hermione shrugged as she took in the destruction she created. "Crude but effective."

Picking the blanket back up off of the ground, the young witch approached the diadem's place on the floor far from the rest of the trash where it had slung. She dropped the fabric over the tiara and balled it in the center of the material before liberating it from the floor, making sure that no skin would come in contact with its metal.

Retracing her steps back to her bag and dropping the wadded up blanket inside, Hermione exited the room to try a fifth time to create a room only she could enter that she could work in peacefully.

Once again, the oak door appeared.

Once again, the girl stepped into the room without her bag as a test.

Once again, she reached out and slowly introduced her bag to the room.

And for once, the room stayed as it was.

"Yes!" Hermione cheered as she leaped onto the cozy couch in front of the small fire, celebrating her final conquest of the room.

Deciding to test the room again, Hermione left her school bag resting beside the couch but kept the locket in her pocket.

She exited the room and consciously requested the room with unwanted things inside.

On the third pass before the wall, Hermione viewed the Gothic-style metal door. She opened the door to find her study room.

Closing the door, she dropped the locket by the bare wall and once again passed for the junk.

The metal door appeared.

She opened the door to find the now familiar rows of stuff.

She picked up the locket, stepped inside the room with the necklace still outside, and then slowly introduced the jewelry into the room.

Again, she watched as the room destroyed itself and reconstructed the study area. This time however the floor seemed to collapse, dumping all of the room's contents before closing the hole with the soft carpet. The ceiling dropped into a lower-rise, flat surface after the walls inched into a more confined space. The fireplace constructed itself within one of the walls brick by brick as if created by ghost hands. The fire ignited happily after logs fell from the shoot. The board on the back wall seemed to ooze out of the brick's mortar before solidifying. The couch and a coffee table fell from a black hole in the ceiling. The last thing to appear was her bag. It bounced off of the couch before coming to rest exactly where she placed it on the ground earlier leaning against the comfy piece of furniture.

Deciding she had had enough with messing with the room because of the consequential dizzy spells, Hermione dropped the locket on the table before exiting the study.

It was time to go through that other room for anything useable.

She went back into the room of hidden things and scavenged for hours, finding books and materials that she could already tell would help her on her quest to restore Sirius and maybe some items that would assist her on one of her other many projects she had began researching last year.

She was very satisfied with her work for the day.

Seeing that she had missed breakfast, the young girl ran out of the room in the direction of her first class.

For the first time in what felt like years, Hermione felt as if luck was finally smiling on her.

* * *

Hermione walked into her second class of the new school year without the slightest bit of nervous anxiety mixed with overwhelming excitement at the prospect of learning something new for the very first time in her entire school career. Charms had been interesting today when she realized the first half of the school year would be dedicated to the different variants of warding and shielding spells. It would provide her with new possible avenues of research in regards to Harry's special protection. Potions, however, was not creating the same bubble of stimulation that it once did.

She could hear the Siren's call of her bed ringing enticingly in her head as she impassively surveyed the room she had gotten to know so very well over the last five years. Nothing was the same as it had been from Professor Snape's occupation of the prestigious position as Hogwart's resident Potion Master.

Hermione absently wondered how Harry took the news that Snape would be teaching his favorite class this year. Not well, she assumed.

Probably made some sarcastic quip about the positions supposed curse, thought the teenage witch as she continued her observations.

The room, which normally had shadows hugging the walls and jars of grotesque ingredients peeking from the partially opened supply closet, was strangely bright and cheery despite being in the underground dungeons of the castle. Four potions were lines in a neat row in front of a large, ornate desk that contained some type of over the top detailing, causing the piece of furniture to look gaudy instead of elegant, which Hermione assumed was what the professor was going for.

The teenager glanced at the cauldrons, mentally identifying each potion. She snorted to herself when she saw the brown goop, gurgling and burping away in its metal confines.

If Harry was here, she thought to herself, he would share her humor in regards to that potion since she brewed it four years ago.

She skipped to the next one in the line, observing that the potion looked for all intents and purposes like still water, but a closer inspection revealed that the cauldron's contents had a slightly different consistency from the universal solvent as well as not coming to a natural boil while resting over the wizarding equivalent of a Bunsen burner.

Veritaserum, she concluded before moving to the next item.

This potion contained a distinctive mother-of-pearl sheen with steam rising off of it in spirals.

Deciding to not tempt her already heavy mind with something else to over think, Hermione opted to deny herself the pleasure of discovering what Amortentia would smell like to her, for she already had a sneaky suspicion, one that she was not ready to have confirmed in front of classmates that were still after five years virtual strangers to her.

The last of the potions, sitting in a small black cauldron, rested on Slughorn's desk, conveying that it held some importance for today's lesson. The potion itself was the color of molten gold with its droplets the size of goldfish leaping out of its confines without spilling a single precious drop of its contents.

"Felix Felicis," breathed Hermione. That potion would come in handy to anyone who could get their hands on it. Liquid luck, however, was also known to have rather drastic side effects. "You," she said directly to the potion, "are the definition of a little goes a long way."

Hearing the door to the Potion Master's office creak open, Hermione backed away from the front of the room to find her seat at one of the six twin-seated desks positioned much closer to the professor's desk then she really desired to be in this afternoon, especially with Potions being a double block that day.

The man that entered through the doorway was large and round with a walrus-like mustache stretched across his pudgy face. His manner of dress reminded Hermione of a university professor from one of her parents' old black-and-white films rather than a potions' instructor.

Of course, that could have more to do with her ideal Potions' Master wearing all black and swooping down on unsuspecting students like a vampire out of a horror flick.

She noticed that the buttons lined down his burgundy waist coat looked as though they were struggling to stay sewn to the fabric; a single breath would liberate them from their confines to shoot across the room like a tiny missile.

Merlin, the man even wore a bowtie.

"Good afternoon, good afternoon, good afternoon," rumbled the professor in his booming jovial voice.

Hermione was not sure what to make of the man before her. He seemed so naturally pleasant as though the world around him was not crumbling into chaos or that fear was not tainting the air, polluting the minds of the masses.

Maybe that was why Professor Snape finally got the position he had been coveting for years. His very presence was a constant reminder of the dangers outside the castle walls.

"Now class, as you can see, I have a few potions up at the front of the room. Can anyone tell me what this first one is?"

Instead of shooting her hand in the air like normal, Hermione hung back from answering the professor's inquires about the potions she already identified in her head to let her classmates shine before the new instructor.

She had a feeling that this would probably insight some type of gossip, but she had more important things to worry about then making a good first impression on a man who would probably only be here for a year. After all, if the position really is cursed, Snape will more than likely retake his previous position next year, so there was no reason to get attached to Slughorn.

"Very good, Mr. Boot. It seems that my predecessor imparted the ability to identify potions to you knowledgeable few."

Hermione heard someone to the left of her snort at Slughorn's comment. Snape did more than insure that his classes could tell potions apart; the man drilled it into their heads with blatant ridicule and scathing derision when a substance was not correctly identified. It became a necessity instead of an exhibition of knowledge.

Merlin, she was already starting to miss the man's technique.

Maybe she's a bit of a masochist.

"That will be ten points to Ravenclaw," continued the professor.

Hermione ignored the strange looks she garnered from not demonstrating her usual amount of enthusiasm for class at all in the lesson as Slughorn explained the presence of the liquid luck simmering on his desk.

"Now," he began, clapping his hands together in anticipation, "we are going to have a bit of a competition for the Felix Felicis. The first one to finish brewing the Draught of the Living Death correctly will win a vial containing enough liquid luck for twelve hours, just enough to make an ordinary day...extraordinary."

Hermione watched Slughorn take in all of the enraptured faces scattered throughout the room. She knew that each person was imagining what could happen to them if they were to possess a potion with such power as to subtly influence their decisions enough to ensure that something magnificent happened to them.

"Now, if everyone could pull out your books and turn to page 142 for the instructions, the ingredients are on the board." With a flick of his wand, chalk whizzed across the board, leaving the necessary ingredients for the potion in its wake. "We will begin once everyone resumes his or her seat."

Hermione closed her eyes and took a deep breath before making her way up to the new professor's desk, avoiding a few of the anxious students racing to the supply closet.

"Professor Slughorn? I don't have...I mean...I was unable to..."

The man's cheery countenance seemed to sharpen when he focused his attention exclusively on her. Maybe there was more to this man then she previously thought.

"Miss Granger, correct?"

"Yes, sir."

He gave her a slight nod of understanding. "There are some old copies of the required text in the cupboard by my desk. You are welcome to one those."

She did not know who alerted the professor to her plight of being unable to journey to Diagon Ally to purchase all of her school supplies, but she sent a mental 'Thank you' to whoever did while gaving the man in front of her a verbal one.

"Thank you, professor." Hermione ducked her head as she headed towards the cupboard.

"Just replace the one you took when you buy a new one," airily replied Slughorn, already turning back to what he was writing before she interrupted him.

Hermione peaked inside the cupboard to find among old, rusted cauldrons, incomplete beaker sets, and empty potion bottles two copies of the sixth-year NEWT-level potion's text nestled between a well worn copy of _The Potion Master's Index_ and a thickly bound journal of some kind. The copies could not be more dissimilar if they tried. The top one looked brand new with the spin still perfectly intact and the corners pristine. There appeared to be no scuffs, no scrapes, or any other markings to indicate that the book was ever used or even removed from its first place of residence and placed into a backpack or satchel. When Hermione moved the first to look at the second, she could see that the second one was truly and completely the first's opposite. The spine was broken and cracked in multiple places. The front cover seemed to be holding strong to the bindings by mere threads. The corners were all bent and split. The pages were worn and slightly yellowed from constant contact with either human hands or potion ingredients. But despite the damage, Hermione could tell that the owner tried to take special care of the textbook. She could feel the lingering magic of repairing charms tingle against her fingertips. Whoever owned this book before truly appreciated it.

That was the one she wanted.

She felt a kinship with the owner of the used book.

Decision made, Hermione tucked her newly acquired book under her arm and made her way back to her station.

"Now that everyone has a textbook and their supplies, you may begin brewing..."

The classroom's door flew open.

Harry, frazzled and out of breath, came tumbling into the room, an frustrated expression on his face until he spotted Slughorn. Hermione witnessed a flash of annoyance flicker through his eyes before he adopted an apologetic countenance.

"Ah, Harry my boy. You were almost late for our little competition."

"Sorry professor. I was unaware until just now that I had your class this year."

"Not to worry. Not to worry. Grab a book from that cabinet there and find a seat. You are too late to join in our second little competition but you can still work on the day's potion."

Hermione watched Harry pull out the pristine copy of the class's textbook and scramble into the seat by her, bypassing the supply closet. Luckily, she had plenty for two or the class would be held up longer.

Hermione flipped open her book to the appropriate page and discovered handwritten additions and shortcuts to brewing the prescribed draught. She was amazed at the brilliance in the suggestions. The alternative steps and quantities of ingredients cut the brewing time down by fifteen minutes and added to the potion's potency.

The handwriting in the book looked slightly familiar to the young witch. There was something about the spiky lettering that nagged at her. She had seen this handwriting; she was just not sure where.

Deciding to worry about it after class, Hermione turned her attention back to her potion, incorporating the some but not all of the previous owner's suggestions. She could not in good conscience use the steps she could not have figured out on her own. It seemed too much like cheating to her.

Satisfied with her progress, which was at least two steps ahead of the others, Hermione addressed the curiosity sitting beside her. "What are you doing here?"

Harry huffed. "McGonagall informed me that I had to take this class."

"Was it not on your schedule," asked Hermione in confusion as she continued chopping up the roots and adding it to her black liquid concoction.

"No, it was. I just thought it was an error. After all, I only got an Acceptable for this class," returned Harry, succeeding in producing the necessary bluish steam.

"I guess someone decided to make an exception in your case," returned the young witch with an amused smile stretching across her face.

"I was afraid of that," sighed Harry, looking forlornly at the messy mixture bubbling the wrong color in his cauldron.

"Is Ron going to be showing up or is it just us this time?" She decided to take the books suggestion and crush to sopophorous bean instead of attempting to cut into its hard exterior, earning her the desired lilac coloring.

"Ron's grade was the same as mine, remember? I'm here in protest." Harry finally got his potion to the black Hermione created three steps ago after she advised him to add something the book did not even ask for to get him back on task.

"So, I take it Auror is no longer your career of choice."

"After last year, I don't think a lot of students are going to be lining up to join the Ministry even without the war going on. Lady Toad made enemies in all for houses in the end after all."

"That reminds me. After class, we need to look up how to duplicate memories." Hermione looked at her book to discover she only had to stir her potion a few times to get the clear shin she needed. Deciding to once again take the book's advice, the young witch began the counterclockwise motions instead of the clockwise ones from the author's instructions.

Harry looked up from his green potion (which should be purple by step seven) in confusion, raising an eyebrow in inquiry.

"I'll tell you later," declared the young witch as she made the final five counterclockwise stirs and single clockwise one before removing the potion to cool so she could bottle it. The Felix Felicis appeared to be hers.

"Time's up," declared Slughorn. "Stop stirring."

The professor looked around the room and began his inspections.

Hermione was the only one with a perfectly completed potion.

"You truly have a talent dear," cried Slughorn as he fawned over her creation a little too much for the young witch's taste. She was not sure how to take his positive input after Snape's taciturn reaction to her previous work. "Are you perhaps related to Hector Dagworth-Granger, who founded the Most Extraordinary Society of Potioneers?"

Hermione thought the sparkle in his eyes odd for the question he asked. He looked like Christmas had come early.

"No, sir. I am a Muggle-born."

Slughorn seemed to glow with that information and turned to Harry; his expression however dimmed slightly when he discovered the disaster that was Harry's potion. Looks like someone just discovered why the Boy-Who-Lived was not originally signed up for this class this year. "Would this be the 'brilliant friend' you mentioned on the train, my boy?"

Harry simply nodded, hoping his refusal to engage the professor would get to the attention off of him and back on to his friend.

It worked.

Git.

"Well, well, here is your reward, my dear. I look forward to observing your skills in the future."

Hermione smiled slightly as she received her prize, trying to not look as excited as she truly felt. She was not sure how exactly she was going to use the liquid luck, but just possessing the bottle, and adding it to her good fortune from that morning's discovery, the teenager could feel herself leaping towards the conclusion of her quest to recover Sirius.

This year was already looking up.

* * *

_Not as long as I wanted, but...oh well_

**Review?**


	13. Chapter 12

_AN: Thanks for the reviews. You guys are awesome!_

* * *

The duo entered the Gryffindor common room to find the third of their trio waiting for them on one of the sofas by the empty fireplace.

"So, how was Potions," asked Ron. "The new guy has to be better than the dungeon bat after all."

Hermione sighed as she dropped her backpack beside the armchair before collapsing in the seat. "Ronald, his name is Professor Snape. You should use it every once in a while, add some variety to your language."

"I like my language to be colored with insults, thanks," replied the redhead smartly.

Harry snickered as he took a seat next to his mate on the sofa. "So far he seems alright. But of course, anyone would be after Snape."

"Professor Snape," muttered Hermione to herself as she began rummaging through her bag so she could start on the previous lesson's homework. She tuned out the boys as Harry started to explain the fine attributes of the new Potion Master since they all seemed to end with the words "unlike Snape" being voiced. What did grab her attention however was Harry's explanation of the brewing competition.

With wonder coloring his tone, Ron replied, "Yeah, I would give almost anything for some guaranteed luck."

"Luck..."

Hermione's eyes contained a strange gleam in them when she focused her attention onto the Boy-Who-Lived. "Harry, I need some of your blood."

"What?"

"'Mione, blood in spell casting is dark magic," objected Ron.

Ignoring the redhead, the witch turned to Harry, scribbling notes as she explained her reasons for needing some of her friend's life-force. "Look, if I'm right, I think I just made a breakthrough in figuring out your mother's wards."

"Hermione..."

"It's got to be a combo," muttered Hermione, already lost in her own mind with a new parameter to sort through and add to her growing collection of snippets and possibilities pertaining to Lily Potter's amazing but unrecognized understanding of magic, which was apparently on a totally different level then what had been previously explored by traditional concepts of the tried and found true method of spell crafting.

"What?"

Harry's question broke through her concentration, forcing her to redirect her attention back to her apparently lost friends looking at her with expressions somewhere between awed confusion and bewildered horror.

"Your mother more than likely adapted some type of combination spell with the amplification of a very complex potion that she had to invent herself in order to manufacture a shield against the Killing Curse. I'm unsure if I will ever be able to recreate what your mother invented without her personal notes on the subject, and who knows where they are, but ..."

"...But, you need my blood to even get stated in unraveling the potion part of the equation?"

"Yes. I think, perhaps, that there might be some variant of Felix Felicis involved. I wonder if that does not explain some of your more death-defying exploits as well."

"You think that my mum had me ingest the potion ahead of time?"

"Wait," cut in Ron. "I am completely lost. What are we talking about? What spell? What potion?"

"Oh, that's right," said Hermione, blinking at her confused friend. "We have not filled you in about all of that yet, have we?" She turned to look at Harry before dropping to dig through her bag again. As she pulled out an empty vial from her Potions' kit, she informed Ron, "Harry can fill you in with the particulars. Harry, give me your hand."

Harry slowly presented Hermione with his left hand, deciding that finding out something extraordinary about his mother was more important than the momentary pain of blood extraction.

Hermione healed his hand before spelling the vial to keep its contents fresh and useable as well as protected from breaking. She repacked her bags and made her way towards the exit of Gryffindor Tower.

Running off in the direction of the library, the young woman only vaguely heard Ron calling after her, reminding her that she still had two more classes today and could not stay sequestered with her books and her equations.

She knew that.

She did not need the faculty to single her out any more than they already did. The pitiful looks were bad enough, but if they turned to those of disappointment because she started missing classes, she feared they would perform some type of intervention, or worse still, begin watching her every move.

If she was to make any type of headway in one of her extracurricular projects, she had to maintain perfect attendance if not perfect performance in all of her classes. She just did not have the energy to be the ideal student any longer, but that did not mean that she was going to slack off with her school work or perform her class work below par. Her eidetic memory would prevent her from having to spend additional time rereading the books she devoured over the summer, leaving her with hours of free time to explore and discover the possible answers to the confounded questions that had been plaguing her since her horrifying jaunt in the Department of Mysteries.

Instead of spending hours in the library like Ron warned against, Hermione grabbed several books on the subjects of inquiry she had been traveling through her head.

She decided to save the reading for later and made her way back to her personal room in the Room of Requirement.

She expanded the room to include a potions-slash-chemistry area for the examination of Harry's blood.

Satisfied with the additions, Hermione continued her exploration of Vanishing Cabinet until it was time for her next class, forgoing lunch.

The rest of the day went by relatively smoothly. In addition to Charms and Potions on Mondays, Hermione had Ancient Runes right after lunch followed by History of Magic and Herbology. Luckily only Potions was a double at the beginning of the week with Charms lengthening on Wednesdays and Herbology on Fridays.

She finished her work in Ancient Runes with plenty of time to spare for reading about the history and applications of Felix Felicis while History of Magic allowed her a free block of time to research the methods for extracting and containing a memory.

During dinner, the one meal she promised Professor McGonagall she would see her attend, Hermione reviewed the applications of transportation spells on inanimate objects between bites of whatever Harry had put on her plate.

Food did not seem to have much of a taste any longer.

Not since the fire.

That night, Hermione went to bed feeling, not lighter, but closer to finding the answers she was seeking.

Slowly but surely, she was finding a way to write some of the wrongs and injustices around her.

Maybe her research will save someone's life.

Maybe her research will save _his_ life.

Maybe.

Hopefully.

* * *

Once again suffocating darkness surrounded her. Once again she drowned in the engulfing black that clothed her petite form in shadows and mystery. Once again she stood blind to anything and everything around her.

Everything was the same.

Everything stayed the same.

Same blackness.

Same dark.

Night after night, Hermione stood completely exposed to the terror and pain breathing down on her.

Everything was the same except for the sounds.

That night, there was no sound.

No screams, no cries, no moans; there was nothing but utter, unsettling quiet.

The young witch took a deep breath as she strained her ears for any noise to indicate that she was not standing in the dark alone.

There was nothing.

No sound.

"Hello?"

Hermione's voice shook as she called out again, "_Hello?_"

She clenched her hands to stay their trembling.

She did not know what to do. She did not know where to turn, where to look, where to move.

She had never been afraid of the dark as a child. She was never scared of monsters hiding under her bed or in her closet.

But this blackness, this overwhelming dark shook her to her very core.

Tears began to well behind her closed eyelids as she tried to regain her composure.

She silently begged to herself as she tried calling out one more time that someone would answer, that she was in fact not alone in the dark.

"Hello," said Hermione, voice shaky and horse, thick with choked back tears.

She let out an involuntary sob when the only answer she received was more silence.

There was no noise.

Nothing.

No guidance to lead her through the dark.

No reassurance.

No familiar voice.

She let out another sob.

Then another.

Then another.

She collapsed to her knees like she did just yesterday in front of a newly visible Thestral and her best friend.

She cried and cried until she ran out of tears.

She hated being alone.

* * *

_AN: Sorry for the short chapter. It was originally meant to be a part of the previous chapter, but it got cut so I could get you guys an update. Not really happy with this but hopefully the next will make up for what this one lacks._

_The next chapter is Defense class. I'm thinking dueling. Anybody got any suggestions for dueling partners?_


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